Charles   Josselyn. 


LIFE,  DEATH,  AND 
IMMORTALITY 


BY 


WILLIAM  HANNA  THOMSON,  M.D.,  LL.D. 

Author  of  "  Brain  and  Personality," 
"What  is  Physical  Life"  etc. 

CONSULTING  PHYSICIAN  TO  THE  ROOSEVELT  HOS- 
PITAL ;  TO  THE  NEW  YORK  STATE  MANHATTAN 
HOSPITALS  FOR  THE  INSANE ;  AND  TO  THE  NEW 
YORK  RED  CROSS  HOSPITAL;  FORMERLY  PRO- 
FESSOR OF  THE  PRACTICE  OF  MEDICINE  AND  OF 
DISEASES  OF  THE  NERVOUS  SYSTEM,  NEW  YORK 
UNIVERSITY  MEDICAL  COLLEGE;  EX-PRESIDENT 
OF  THE  NEW  YORK  ACADEMY  OF  MEDICINE,  ETC. 


NEW  YORK  AND  LONDON 

FUNK  &  WAGNALLS   COMPANY 

1911 


T5" 


COPYRIGHT,  1911,  BY 
FUNK  &  WAGNALLS  COMPANY 

PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 

Published,  November,  1911 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.     Facts  and  not  Theories  about  Life  on 

this  Earth 9 

II.     Three  Great  Epochs  in  the  History  of 

Life  on  this   Earth    .        .        .        .        21 

III.  The  Third    Epoch,   that  of    Personal 

Beings 27 

IV.  The    Brain        ......        35 

V.      Immortality 49 

VI.     The  Verdict  of  History  as  to  Human 

Nature 59 

VII.     Can    Life    Come    into    Existence    by 

Chance?        .        .        .        .        .  73 

VIII.     Resurrection  of  the  Body    .        .        .        91 
IX.     Heaven  as  Described  in  the  Bible  105 


015753 


LIFE,  DEATH,  AND  IMMORTALITY 


Chapter  I 

FACTS    AND    NOT    THEORIES 

ABOUT    LIFE    ON    THIS 

EARTH 


Chapter  I 

FACTS  AND  NOT  THEORIES 

ABOUT   LIFE    ON    THIS 

EARTH 

A  PURE  theorist  is  one  who  on  occasion 
can  altogether  part  company  with  facts. 
Such  persons  are  particularly  numerous 
when  the  subject  of  the  origin  and  nature 
of  Life  is  under  discussion,  for  they  find 
it  affords  such  wing  to  speculation  that 
they  need  no  approach  to  facts.  There- 
fore both  in  ancient  and  in  modern  times 
we  hear  life  spoken  of  as  a  great  ocean 
from  which  every  individual  life  is  derived 
and  to  which  it  shall  return. 

Thus  a  Hindu  taking  up  a  little  water 
from  the  River  Ganges  in  the  palm  of  his 
hand  said,  "  There  is  the  life  of  man  as 
9 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

he  now  lives  here,"  and  emptying  it  back 
into  the  great  flowing  river,  "  there  is 
man  returning  to  the  whence  from  which 
he  came."  Such  pantheistic  conceptions 
have  always  had  a  fascination  for  many 
minds  who  claim  to  worship  great  ideas 
instead  of  great  things.  Ideas  are  their 
only  realities,  and  everything  else  they 
look  upon  as  helow  their  notice.  This 
they  can  well  do  so  long  as  they  keep  clear 
of  the  great  subject  of  life,  because  life 
on  this  earth,  which  is  the  only  life  we  can 
observe  and  know  anything  about,  does 
not  exist  apart  from  living  things,  as  the 
first  mosquito  that  bites  them  would  show. 
To  them,  however,  everything  is  one,  and 
one  is  everything.  This  compels  them 
sooner  or  later  to  confound  subject  and 
object  as  one  and  the  same,  in  order  to 
escape  from  dualism.  Hence  when  a  man 
is  looking  at  that  interesting  object,  the 
moon,  as  he  is  the  subject  which  sees  that 
10 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

object  the  moon,  therefore  he  and  the 
moon  are  one,  a  conclusion  which  only 
lunatics  would  draw. 

Life  is  encountered  everywhere  on  this 
earth,  but  always  obstinately  refuses  to 
present  itself  except  in  separate  living 
forms.  Life  here  belongs  to  nothing 
which  is  either  universal  or  general,  rather 
it  is  invariably  individual  and  particular. 
It  is  in  vain  that  we  can  look  for  some  ex- 
ception to  this  certain  fact  by  hunting  for 
life  with  the  microscope,  though  there  we 
actually  meet  with  the  largest  department 
of  the  living  kingdom  whose  forms,  how- 
ever minute,  never  merge  into  each  other 
or  into  anything  else,  any  more  than  cows 
merge  into  sheep.  Among  bacteria,  ./ 
tho  eight  billions  of  a  larger  form  can 
find  room  in  the  space  of  a  pin's  head,  not 
one  of  these  billions  ever  merges  into  the 
rest,  any  more  than  the  blades  of  grass 
will  mix  on  a  prairie.  Nor  is  the  case  anyj 
11 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

different  if  we  turn  to  those  powerful 
agents  like  the  virus  of  hydrophobia  or  of 
yellow  fever,  which  are  too  small  to  be  seen 
by  any  microscope.  Every  biologist,  or 
student  of  life,  is  certain  that  these  are  as 
distinct  and  specific  as  any  species  which 
are  visible,  for  hydrophobia  no  more  re- 
sembles yellow  fever  than  a  horse  looks 
like  a  fish. 

Life  indeed  is  much  the  most  important 
fact  that  we  know  of.  If  this  earth  were 
without  life  it  would  certainly  be  an  un- 
interesting vacuum,  as  uninteresting  as 
lifeless,  interstellar  space.  But  as  it  is,  it 
furnishes  an  endless  variety,  not  of  ideas, 
but  of  important  facts. 

Hence  we  cannot  escape  asking  the 
question  whether  life  associated  with  ma- 
terial bodies  exists  elsewhere  than  on  this 
earth.  The  answer  is  that  at  best  it  must 
be  very  scarce  in  the  universe,  owing  to 
one  certain  fact,  namely,  the  extremely 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

narrow  range  of  temperature  in  which 
physical  life  is  possible.  The  temperature 
212°,  or  that  of  boiling  water,  usually 
sterilizes  or  kills  all  life.  But  the  temper- 
ature of  the  sun  is  estimated  at  13,000°, 
and  storms  rage  in  its  hot  atmosphere,  be- 
side which  the  worst  earthly  cyclone  would 
be  but  a  gentle  zephyr.  But  our  sun  is 
relatively  a  cool  body  among  those  fiery 
suns  called  the  fixed  stars.  Professor 
Simon  Newcomb  calculates  that  the 
mighty  Canopus  is  100,000  times  larger, 
and  100,000  times  hotter  than  our  sun, 
so  that  if  the  earth  were  to  approach  Ca- 
nopus as  near  as  it  is  to  the  sun,  that  is 
about  90,000,000  of  miles  off,  it  would  be 
instantly  vaporized. 

Theories,  however,  are  the  most  elastic 
of  things.  Hence  as  no  one  can  think  of 
peopling  burning  suns,  theorists  imagine 
that  these  may  have  numerous  planets, 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

and  that  all  which  is  needed  in  a  planet 
is  to  be  a  planet,  and  it  will  then  have  in- 
telligent inhabitants  just  as  it  has  rocks 
and  stones.  As  no  fixed  star  has  yet  been 
discovered  with  planets,  it  is  taken  for 
granted  that  these  are  too  small  to  be  vis- 
ible at  such  a  distance.  However,  since 
so  many  of  the  fixed  stars  are  double,  what 
would  happen  to  planets  revolving  around 
or  between  them  is  not  hard  to  imagine. 

Our  only  course,  therefore,  is  to  come 
back  to  our  own  sun  and  its  planets,  for 
these  can  give  us  facts  instead  of  hypoth- 
eses, and  these  facts  show  that  not  one  of 
the  sun's  planets  except  the  earth  is  the 
abode  of  life.  Thus  Venus,  which  is  the 
nearest  to  us,  and  almost  the  size  of  the 
earth,  cannot  support  life,  because  it  al- 
ways turns  the  same  face  to  the  sun  as  the 
moon  does  to  us.  Its  people,  therefore, 
would  be  persistently  scorched  on  one  side 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

of  that  planet,  while  on  the  other  side  they 
would  be  frozen  stiff  in  their  cold,  unend- 
ing night.  The  case  is  just  the  same  with 
the  planet  Mercury.  We  must  therefore 
turn  to  the  other  planets,  Mars,  Jupiter, 
Saturn,  Uranus  and  Neptune.  Jupiter  is 
certainly  big  enough  for  a  great  popula- 
tion because  it  is  1,300  times  larger  than 
the  earth,  but  Jupiter  is  of  such  low  spe- 
cific  gravity  that  it  must  be  largely  made 
up  of  fluids  and  vapors.  Our  own  solid 
earth,  which  is  seven  times  heavier  than 
if  it  were  all  granite,  would  go  clean 
through  Jupiter,  if  it  hit  him,  as  easily 
as  a  bullet  would  traverse  a  large  pumpkin. 
But  if  Jupiter  has  a  solid  surface,  which 
astronomers  doubt,  then  according  to  the 
law  that  the  weight  of  a  body  at  its  sur- 
face is  directly  proportional  to  the  plan- 
et's mass,  a  man  who  weighs  140  pounds 
here,  on  Jupiter  would  weigh  considerably 
15 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

over  ten  tons,  a  very  inconvenient  weight 
for  either  walking  or  dancing. 

Conditions  for  life  are  no  better  on 
Saturn,  Uranus,  or  Neptune,  for  astron- 
omers are  generally  of  the  opinion  that 
all  four  of  these  planets,  including  Jupi- 
ter, are  in  much  the  same  state  as  the  earth 
was  before  it  cooled  so  as  to  have  a  solid 
surface  largely  covered  with  water  and 
surrounded  by  its  atmosphere. 

There  remains  little  Mars,  which  has  a 
diameter  of  4,000  miles,  or  about  half  that 
of  the  earth,  with  a  corresponding  amount 
of  light  and  heat.  Mars  has  lately  been 
the  favorite  planet  with  theorists,  but  the 
facts  are  that  it  has  an  atmosphere,  tho, 
as  thin  as  that  on  the  top  of  our  Andes. 
It  has  periods  of  summer  and  of  winter, 
during  which  its  poles  alternately  turn 
white  as  if  from  snow.  Its  surface  is 
marked  with  long  straight  lines  which  the 
astronomer  Lowell  takes  to  be  veritable 
16 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

canals  dug  by  its  inhabitants.  But  we 
must  protest  against  astronomers  having 
anything  to  say  about  life,  for  their  only 
instrument  is  the  telescope,  while  the  in- 
strument of  the  biologist,  or  student  of 
life,  is  the  microscope.  The  training  of  an 
astronomer  no  more  fits  him  to  speak' 
about  life  than  it  fits  him  to  understand 
Chinese,  as  Mr.  Lowell  shows  when,  in- 
stead of  primitive  rhizopods  or  sponges, 
he  finds  on  Mars  engineers  with  the  pow- 
ers of  archangels  digging  canals  beside 
which  the  Panama  Canal  would  be  like  a 
farmer's  ditch.  More  recent  telescopes, 
however,  with  larger  apertures,  have  al- 
tered the  appearance  of  these  markings 
on  Mars,  and  made  them  like  the  results 
of  simply  physical  agencies  similar  to  the 
great  rifts  in  the  Antarctic  ice  cap. 

What  is  left  to  us,  therefore,  is  the  story 
of  life  upon  this  earth,  and  that  presents 
us  with  enough  facts  to  claim  our  whole 
17 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

attention,  because  that  story  is  fully  illus- 
trated by  remains  in  the  rocky  strata  of 
the  globe,  so  well  preserved  that  the  most 
delicate  ferns  have  left  perfect  imprints  in 
what  are  now  masses  of  solid  rock. 


Chapter  II 

THREE    GREAT    EPOCHS    IN 

THE    HISTORY    OF    LIFE    ON 

THIS    EARTH 


Chapter  II 

THREE     GREAT     EPOCHS     IN 

THE  HISTORY  OF  LIFE  ON 

THIS    EARTH 

THE  story  of  life  on  this  earth  presents 
three  great  epochs  in  its  development. 
The  first  is  when  microscopic  unicellular 
or  single-celled  forms  held  the  field  for 
untold  ages  exclusively  to  themselves,  and 
have  left  great  portions  of  the  earth's 
crust  to  mark  their  work.  All  limestones 
for  example  were  made  by  them.  To  this 
day  these  microscopic  forms  constitute 
the  largest  division  of  the  kingdom  of  life, 
because  whereas  all  visible  forms,  wheth- 
er plant  or  animal,  are  necessarily  local, 
the  microscopic  forms  are  everywhere 
where  life  is  possible.  They  therefore 
21 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

hold  very  important  relations  to  the  other 
divisions  of  the  living  kingdom,  for  all 
plants  and  animals  would  soon  cease  to 
exist  but  for  them. 

The  second  epoch  occurred  during  what 
is  called  the  Cambrian  period  of  geology, 
whose  rocks  contain  the  first  known  re- 
mains of  multicellular  instead  of  unicellu- 
lar forms  of  life.  This  marks  a  por- 
tentous change  from  the  former  period, 
because,  whereas  before  every  living  cell 
existed  by  itself  and  for  itself,  and  multi- 
plied only  by  simple  division,  new  cells 
then  appeared  whose  business  it  was  to  co- 
operate with  each  other  and  thus  form  a 
multicellular  body  as  our  own  bodies  are 
now.  We  must  keep  these  facts  in  mind 
in  order  adequately  to  appreciate  what  a 
change  took  place  upon  the  advent  of 
cells  bound  together  to  cooperate  with 
one  another  to  form  a  multicellular  body. 
From  this  time  on  every  kind  of  progress 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

became  possible  because  so  universally, 
and  yet  so  nicely  is  one  part  of  a  multi- 
cellular  body  related  to  the  others  that 
Professor  Richard  Owen,  by  studying  the 
relations  of  a  single  tooth  finally  correctly 
reconstructed  the  whole  animal,  as  was 
afterwards  proved  by  the  discovery  of  its 
fossil  remains. 

But  now  another  important  element  ap- 
pears. The  tissues  of  a  multicellular 
body  are  by  no  means  all  of  the  same  rank. 
Some  are  merely  mechanical  in  their  func- 
tions, such  as  the  tendons  and  ligaments 
or  the  cartilages  which  cushion  the  sur- 
faces of  joints.  But  other  cells  are  for 
necessary  secretions.  Other  cells  again 
are  much  higher  in  rank  than  the  preced- 
ing, namely,  the  muscle  cells,  but  the  high- 
est of  all  is  a  new  cell  altogether,  the  nerve 
cell,  furnishing  the  most  perfect  instru- 
ment for  promoting  quick  coordination  in 
the  whole  body.  Thus  it  is  difficult  to 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

measure  the  distance  between  the  animal 
called  Stentor,  which  has  only  one  affer- 
ent nerve  bringing  a  sensation  to  its  one 
center,  and  one  efferent  nerve  which  re- 
acts to  the  stimulus,  and  the  vast  array 
of  associated  centers  with  their  connect- 
ing fibers  in  the  nervous  system  of  a  cat. 
But  what  is  the  problem  which  now  con- 
fronts us?  Bacteria  might  multiply  to 
infinity  and  still  remain  only  bacteria,  just 
as  bricks  would  never  themselves  make  a 
great  building,  but  only  a  pile  of  bricks. 
Yet  now  that  infinitely  complex  organ- 
ization found  in  an  ear  takes  the  place  of 
separate  cells,  however  numerous,  it  is 
plain  that  we  have  passed  into  a  world 
altogether  unlike  that  of  the  first  epoch 
in  which  life  began. 


Chapter  III 

THE    THIRD    EPOCH,    THAT    OF 
PERSONAL    BEINGS 


Chapter  III 

THE  THIRD  EPOCH,  THAT  OF 
PERSONAL   BEINGS 

THE  third  great  epoch  in  the  life  history 
of  this  earth  is  so  different  from  anything 
which  preceded*  it  that  it  can  neither  be 
called  an  evolution  nor  a  development  of 
any  sort.  It  can  be  denoted  only  by  the 
Latin  phrase  sui  generis.  Preceding  it  in 
time  the  ascending  development  of  ani- 
mal forms  had  culminated  in  the  anthro- 
poid apes.  Biologists  then  correctly  in- 
cluded among  the  primates  the  animal 
Homo,  because  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
physically  he  is  as  much  an  animal  as  the 
rest. 

But  Man  is  infinitely  more  than  an  ani- 
mal, while  there  is  absolutely  nothing  in 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

his  physical  frame  which  explains  why  he 
is  so.  In  every  other  animal  its  physical 
development  explains  everything,  but 
nothing  physical  explains  Man.  It  is 
foolish  to  seek  in  the  human  brain  for  that 
explanation,  because  this  is  closely  pat- 
terned after  the  brain  of  the  chimpanzee 
which  contains  every  lobe  and  lobule 
found  in  the  human  brain.  But  to  all 
eternity  the  chimpanzee  with  his  brain 
could  not  overtake  Man.  The  light  of  the 
sun  takes  eight  minutes  to  reach  the  earth, 
while  it  takes  the  light  of  Alpha  Cen- 
tauri,  the  nearest  to  us  of  the  fixed  stars, 
four  years  and  a  half  to  do  the  same 
thing.  But  this  is  an  imperfect  compar- 
ison with  which  to  illustrate  the  difference 
between  the  animal  Homo  and  Man. 

The  sole  and  sufficient  explanation  of 
all  this  is  that,  besides  being  an  animal, 
Man  is  a  Person,  which  no  other  earthly 
creature  is.  Personality  is  the  greatest 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

fact  in  the  universe,  and  Man  has  all  the 
attributes  of  personality.  Owing  to  his 
personality  he  can  learn,  he  can  know,  he 
can  be,  and  he  can  do  everything,  as  he 
would  show  if  he  had  that  life  which  is 
unmeasured  by  the  flight  of  years,  instead 
of  the  brief  space  of  time  allotted  to  him 
on  this  little  earth.  Even  now  he  has 
changed  the  whole  face  of  the  world,  tho 
with  a  material  body  which  is  too  weak 
to  bear  the  weight  of  his  conscious  will 
without  resting  from  that  burden  in  un- 
conscious sleep  for  one  third  of  his  bodily 
existence.  As  an  engineer,  he  can  look 
up  from  the  base  of  the  greatest  mountain 
ranges,  and  forthwith  tunnel  a  highway 
for  the  nations  through  them,  or  he  can 
span  the  widest  rivers  with  a  bridge, 
every  bolt  or  wire  of  which  existed  in  his 
mind  before  it  existed  on  earth.  As  mas- 
ter of  the  forces  of  Nature,  thunder  no 
longer  awes  or  frightens  him,  for  he  has 
29 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

made  electricity  literally  his  menial  serv- 
ant, whether  in  the  kitchen,  or  to  traverse 
wires  over  land  or  on  the  sea  bottom  to 
convey  his  messages.  More  than  that,  he 
dispenses  with  wires  and  all  tangible 
things  to  make  the  mysterious  Ether  talk 
for  him  across  the  oceans.  .The  Ether  fills 
all  space,  but  does  not  this  show  that  man's 
mind  does  the  same  thing?)  By  a  small 
glass  prism  he  learns  what  the  most  dis- 
tant fixed  stars  are  made  of. 

Yet  all  such  achievements  come  from 
but  one  small  side  of  him.  He  can  also 
be  a  great  scientist,  a  great  thinker,  states- 
man, financier,  mathematician,  philos- 
opher or  poet,  in  fact  anything  which  re- 
quires mind  and  means  mind.  But  why? 
Because  he  is  an  animal? 

There  is  something  almost  pathetic  in 

the  conclusions  of  Huxley  and  some  of 

his  contemporaries,  that  because  they  had 

shown  how  man's  body  had  been  preceded 

30 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

by  connected  stages  of  evolution  up  to 
the  ape's  physical  frame,  therefore  Man 
was  thus  accounted  for  by  science!  And 
to  this  day  many  are  under  the  delusion 
that  the  animal  Homo  can  explain  the  per- 
son Man. 

Personality  instead  is  always  and  for- 
ever invisible.  As  once  I  left  the  Went- 
worth  Hotel  in  Portsmouth,  New  Hamp-  (j 
shire,  because  of  the  expected  crowd  when 
the  Russian  and  Japanese  ambassadors 
were  coming  there  to  negotiate  peace,  I 
thought  how  much  the  Russian  Witte 
would  have  given  if  he  could  telegraph  to 
St.  Petersburg  that  he  had  actually  seen 
the  Japanese  Komura.  All  that  he  saw, 
or  could  see  was  the  courteous  and  smiling 
face  of  the  Oriental  and  no  more.  Man, 
because  he  is  like  God,  is  as  unseen  by 
mortal  eye  as  God  himself. 


31 


Chapter  IV 
THE    BRAIN 


Chapter  IV 
THE   BRAIN 

HAVING  treated  of  personality  at  length, 
the  modern  reader  may  ask  whether  per- 
sonality is  not  located  in  the  Brain.  It  is 
well  that  we  turn  to  this  now  universally 
admitted  fact  that  the  brain  is  the  organ 
of  the  mind,  if  we  would  escape  falling 
into  the  morass  of  metaphysics.  This  is 
because  metaphysicians  for  ages  have  dis- 
cussed the  origin  and  nature  of  personality 
without  coming  to  any  agreement  on  the 
subject.  As  metaphysics  has  thus  become 
discredited,  many  modern  writers  have 
substituted  for  it  the  name  Psychology. 
But  this  is  only  a  change  in  name  and  not 
in  fact,  as  a  critical  examination  of  their 
speculations  show. 

35 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

But  we  must  first  note  that  for  many 
centuries  the  world  had  no  suspicion  that 
the  brain  had  anything  to  do  with  the 
mind.  (The  word  brain  does  not  once  occur 
in  the  Bible.")  Its  writers  instead  looked 
upon  the  heart  as  the  seat  of  the  feelings, 
and  upon  the  bowels  as  the  seat  of  the 
emotions,  while  the  mind,  or  intellect,  was 
in  the  kidneys.  Thus  one  psalmist  says, 
"  My  reins  (kidneys)  instruct  me  in  the 
night  seasons,"  and  Jeremiah  rebukes  the 
hypocrites  of  his  day  who  had  the  Lord 
on  their  tongues,  but  not  in  their  kidneys. 
Nor  were  the  Greeks  better  informed,  for 
Aristotle  says  that  the  chief  business  of 
the  brain  was  to  cool  the  blood  for  the 
heart ! 

We  now  know  that  the  brain  can  be 
used  for  any  special  mental  processes  only 
after  a  material  place  in  it  has  been  pre- 
pared or  organized  for  each  such  process. 
Thus  a  man  is  found  one  morning  wholly 
36 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

unable  to  utter  a  word,  tho  he  can  under- 
stand whatever  is  spoken  to  him.  This 
disability  is  explained  by  the  fact  that  the 
brain  in  one  particular  place  has  been 
ruined  by  an  apoplectic  clot.  Another 
person,  suddenly,  and  without  any  warn- 
ing, cannot  read  a  word  in  either  book  or 
newspaper.  This  is  not  due  to  any  fault 
in  his  eyes,  for  he  can  see  everything  else 
as  well  as  ever,  but  he  cannot  read  a  word, 
because  he  has  become  word  blind.  This 
also  is  because  the  special  brain  seat  for 
reading  has  been  spoiled.  Or  he  can  read 
French,  but  not  his  native  English.  This 
also  is  because  his  brain  seat  for  English 
has  been  destroyed,  but  not  the  French 
place.  Or  his  ability  both  to  speak  and 
to  read  may  be  wholly  gone,  but  he  can 
read  and  calculate  in  figures  as  well  as 
ever.  This  shows  that  while  both  the 
places  for  speaking  and  for  reading  had 
been  ruined,  the  brain  seat  for  figures  is 
37 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

in  another  locality,  and  in  his  case  escaped 
harm. 

Now  to  the  end  of  time  neither  meta- 
physicians nor  psychologists  would  have 
discovered  these  great  facts,  nor  again 
their  important  bearing  on  the  questions 
of  the  relations  of  the  brain  to  the  mind 
and  to  the  personality.  Hence  many  of 
them  resent  this  exclusion  from  discus- 
sions about  things  mental,  and  complain 
that  these  facts  have  been  discovered  only 
at  the  bedside  or  on  the  post-mortem  table, 
instead  of  in  the  depths  of  their  own  con- 
sciousness. Yet  science  is  but  another 
name  for  the  knowledge  of  facts,  and  in 
nothing  does  the  medical  profession  so 
justly  claim  to  be  scientific,  as  in  thus  at- 
tending to  its  own  business  of  investigat- 
ing the  brain,  whether  in  health  or  in  dis- 
ease. 

Moreover  other  great  facts  have  been 
discovered  along  this  line  of  investigation. 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

Anatomists  had  long  been  aware  that  the 
brain  is  a  true  pair  organ  like  the  two 
eyes,  the  two  ears,  the  two  hands,  and  the 
two  feet,  as  it  consists  of  two  perfectly 
matched  hemispheres.  But  in  the  human 
being  it  was  found  that  only  one  of  the 
brain  hemispheres  was  the  organ  of  the 
mind  and  personality,  that  mind  which  is 
so  marvelous  in  faculty,  and  that  person- 
ality which  is  so  infinitely  above  the  brute 
creation.  It  is  with  one  hemisphere  only 
that  a  person  can  learn  to  speak,  to  know, 
to  remember,  to  purpose  and  to  do  any- 
thing, while  the  other  hemisphere  in  his 
head  is  not  used  for  any  mental  act  what- 
ever, but  only  has  the  power  to  receive 
the  sensations,  and  to  move  the  muscles 
of  its  corresponding  half  of  the  body. 
This  fact  alone  suffices  to  show  that  brain 
matter  of  itself  can  neither  think  nor  do 
anything,  because  if  it  could,  then  both 
hemispheres  would  equally  share  in  mind, 
39 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

and  in  the  attributes  of  personality,  which 
is  not  at  all  the  case. 

But  we  were  not  born  so.  At  birth 
neither  hemisphere  knows  anything.  No 
one  has  ever  come  into  this  world  able  to 
do  anything  except  to  cry,  but  not  to 
speak  a  word  in  any  language.  Soon, 
however,  the  baby  shows  that  it  is  begin- 
ning to  learn,  and  at  first  it  seems  to  learn 
by  the  use  of  its  busy  little  hands.  The 
hand  then  most  used  wholly  determines 
which  of  its  two  hemispheres  is  going  on 
to  learn  what  only  a  human  brain  can 
learn.  If  it  be  the  exclusively  human 
faculty  of  speech,  the  brain  centers  for 
speech  will  be  found  in  the  left  hemisphere, 
if  the  baby  is  right  handed,  because  the 
brain  fibers  which  move  the  muscles  cross 
in  their  paths,  so  that  the  left  hemisphere 
governs  the  muscles  of  the  right  side  of 
the  body,  while  the  right  hemisphere  gov- 
erns those  of  the  left  side.  But  what  does 
40 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

this  prove?  It  proves  that  both  hemi- 
spheres are  equally  good  for  becoming 
human  in  faculty,  but  only  one  of  them 
achieves  this  high  distinction  according  to 
its  relation  to  the  most  used  hand. 

As  the  special  material  seats  of  these 
great  mental  faculties  are  found  in  adults 
in  the  left  hemisphere  of  the  right  handed, 
and  in  the  right  hemisphere  of  the  left 
handed,  the  question  arises,  how  does  the 
hand  come  to  hold  such  a  relation  to  them? 
The  answer  is,  that  the  child  begins  to  make 
its  wants  known  to  others  by  gestures  with 
the  hand,  and  to  the  end  of  life  gestures 
continue  to  accompany  or  actually  to  take 
the  place  of  language.  Besides  this,  the 
child  is  constantly  trying  to  find  out  what 
things  are  by  its  hand  or  its  sense  of  touch. 
Now  the  brain  centers  governing  hand 
movements  are  in  close  proximity  to  the 
centers  for  moving  the  lips  and  tongue, 
and  the  child  therefore  soon  adds  vocal 
41 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

speech  to  gesture  speech,  till  by  constant 
repetition  the  speech  centers  in  the  brain 
are  accordingly  organized. 

As  the  brain  centers  could  not  of  them- 
selves turn  into  speech  centers,  else  both 
hemispheres  would  speak  spontaneously, 
how  are  these  centers  formed  in  only  one 
hemisphere?  (The  answer  is,  that  they  are 
formed,  or,  in  other  words,  created  by  the 
child's  own  personality,  and  not  at  all  by 
its  brain,  which  is  the  mere,  passive  in- 
strument of  the  personality.^  This  is 
proved  when,  in  after  years,  the  person 
wants  to  learn  a  new  language  in  addition 

*>-"'  to  that  of  his  mother  tongue.     He  can 
neither  do  this  offhand,  nor  easily,  and  no 

ead}QT&  can  do  it  for  him.  He  must  do  it  all 
/  himself  by  unremitting,  hard  work,  which 
will  take  months  or  years.  Often  the  per- 
son quits  the  task  before  it  is  well  finished, 
because  it  makes  him  weary.  But  if  he  at 
last  succeds,  what  has  happened  in  his 
42 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

brain?  A  new  brain  layer  has  been  cre- 
ated in  his  head  for  talking,  say  French, 
which  is  then  laid  over  the  old  English 
layer,  but  so  independent  of  it  that  the 
English  layer  may  be  ruined  by  an  apo- 
plectic clot,  so  that  he  can  no  longer  talk 
English,  but  he  can  still  talk  French. 

What  is  true  of  the  brain  centers  for 
speech,  has  also  been  shown  to  be  true 
about  any  mental  endowment  which  has 
been  slowly  acquired  by  practice.  Thus 
the  case  of  a  tailor  is  mentioned,  who  sud- 
denly lost  all  ability  to  make  clothes,  and 
had  to  learn  another  trade.  More  than 
one  case  of  accomplished  musicians  has 
been  published,  who  as  suddenly  lost  all 
ability  to  distinguish  tunes,  because  of  an 
injury  to  the  music  center  in  the  temporal 
lobe  of  the  brain.  Now  neither  a  tailor 
nor  a  musician  could  become  proficient  in 
their  respective  acquirements  by  proxy — 
they,  personally,  and  no  others  must  gain 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

these  things  for  themselves.  These  facts 
indubitably  show  that  only  by  the  invisible 
personality  can  the  brain  have  in  it  organ- 
special,  material  places  for  those 
mental  endowments  which  distin- 
guish our  race.  On  that  account  every 
mental  power  of  every  kind,  which  has 
had  to  be  acquired  by  prolonged  effort  on 
the  part  of  the  man  himself,  is  the  most 
personal  of  all  things.  A  great  mathe- 
matician, a  great  chemist,  a  great  scien- 
tist of  any  kind  has  become  so  solely  after 
years  of  hard  work,  and  now  we  learn  the 
reason.  Brain  centers  can  be  formed  in 
such  cases  only  by  the  efforts  of  the  pos- 
sessors of  these  kinds  of  knowledge.  It 
is  the  sculptor  himself,  slowly  and  with 
stroke  after  stroke  who  makes  a  statue  out 
of  marble,  and  likewise  it  is  not  the  brain, 
but  the  man  himself  who  gains  preemi- 
nence in  anything. 

Physicians  were  once  charged  with  be- 
44 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

ing  the  most  materialistic  of  all  profes-j// 
sional  men,  but  they  are  now  coming  for-    /^ 
ward  with  discoveries  about  the  unseen 
personality  in  us,  which  furnish  the  most 
convincing  arguments  of  all  against  the 
doctrines  of  materialism. 


Chapter  V 
IMMORTALITY 


Chapter  V 
IMMORTALITY 

WITH  every  person  his  own  existence  is 
the  greatest  of  certainties.  Whatever 
there  be  outside  of  him,  whether  it  be  only 
an  appearance  or  not,  he  knows  that  he 
exists  because  he  can  always  say,  "  I  am." 
Modern  science  also  proves  that  this  "  I  " 
is  no  more  in  his  brain  that  it  is  in  his 
hand  or  foot,  for  either  can  be  amputated 
without  any  part  of  his  personality  going 
with  it  any  more  than  if  his  hair  were  cut. 
This  could  not  happen  if  he  was  his  body, 
or  the  body  was  himself. 

In  fact  there  is  no  room  for  personality 

in  the  brain,  for  as  we  have  just  shown, 

one  half  of  it  does  not  think  at  all,  while 

the  other  half  which  thinks,  does  so  be- 

49 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

cause  the  man  has  taught  it  to  do  so,  using 
either  of  the  hemispheres  which  happens 
to  be  the  more  convenient  to  him  when  he 
begins. 

It  is  owing  to  the  instinctive  recogni- 
tion that  the  real  self  in  us  is  not  the  same 
*Ju  u^  with  perishable  flesh  and  blood,  that  all 
r  i .  /  mankind  have  believed  in  personal  immor- 
tality. This  fixed  conviction  is  so  univer- 
sal in  the  human  race  that  it  is  as  generic 
as  the  faculty  of  speech  itself.  It  may  take 
different  forms  here  and  there,  but  its  es- 
sential oneness  remains  the  same  through 
them  all.  Among  the  Chinese  and  the 
Japanese,  who  together  constitute  one- 
third  of  the  peoples  of  the  earth,  and  who 
certainly  are  not  a  whit  inferior,  intellec- 
tually, to  the  rest,  it  takes  the  form  of  be- 
lief in  the  continued  existence  after  death 
of  their  ancestors  whom  they  worship  as 
now  supernatural  beings.  This  faith  in 
the  power  of  their  ancestors  caused  us  all 
50 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

to  be  amazed  with  the  dispatch  of  Admiral 
Togo  to  the  Mikado  after  his  great  battle 
in  the  Sea  of  Japan  where  he  destroyed 
the  Russian  fleet.  "  It  was  not  owing  to 
our  bravery  or  skill  or  devotion,"  he  wrote, 
"  but  solely  because  of  the  power  of  your 
Majesty's  ancestors."  Indeed  we  can 
scarcely  appreciate  the  hold  of  this  con- 
viction upon  the  minds  and  lives  of  those 
eastern  peoples,  because  it  is  so  contrary 
to  our  own  modes  of  thought.  A  gentle- 
man who  lived  a  number  of  years  in  the 
city  of  Amoy  in  China  told  me  that  he 
could  secure  any  number  among  the  com-  ^ 
mon  people  of  that  town  to  commit  sui- 
cide for  one  hundred  dollars  apiece.  As  4 

)  t>  o  a*ili 
human  nature  is  the  same  everywhere,  he 

explained  that  as  we  may  find  many  who 
will  lay  down  their  lives  for  their  country, 
and  whom  we  highly  honor  on  that  ac- 
count, so  an  ordinary  Chinaman  is  will- 
ing thus  to  die  for  the  benefit  of  his  chil- 
51 


Ji 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

dren  in  order  that  they  may  worship  him 
afterward  as  an  ancestor  who  died  for  their 
benefit.  This  explains  also  that  noble  rev- 
erence for  their  parents  which  the  Chinese 
display,  because  their  parents  will  soon  be 
endowed  with  all  the  mysterious  powers  of 
J  u  /the  next  world.  Chinese  statesman  will 
also  submit  to  the  greatest  personal  incon- 
venience in  the  cessation  of  their  public 
functions  during  the  long  period  of  their 
mourning  for  the  death  of  either  father  or 
mother.  It  should,  however,  be  noted  that 
this  doctrine  of  immortality  gives  rise  di- 
rectly to  sheer  atheism.  Since  their  an- 
cestors are  all-sufficient  for  the  direction 
and  gudiance  of  their  descendants  on 
earth,  so  there  is  no  need  for  God,  whose 
name  they  have  even  forgotten.  Chris- 
tian missionaries,  therefore,  have  found  it 
difficult  to  agree  upon  a  name  in  the  Chi- 
nese language  for  Our  Supreme  Being. 
The  doctrine  of  human  immortality,  there- 
52 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

fore,  does  not  necessarily  lead  to  anything 
like  Christian  faith.  Yet  so  strong  is  the 
hold  of  this  belief  in  the  survival  of  their 
ancestors  after  death,,  that  it  overrides 
everything  else,  both  in  their  philosophy 
and  in  their  religion.  Hence  Confucian- 
ism is  powerless  against  it,  for  Confucius 
taught  nothing  but  a  system  of  ethics 
which  enjoined  how  men  here  in  this  world 
should  behave  to  one  another.  Buddhism, 
which  so  many  millions  among  those  eas 

ern  races  profess,  is  really  not  a  religion 

££,  t)&\t  f/ 
at  all,  but  a  system  of  philosophy.    Start-      / 

ing  with  the  premise  that  evil  comes  from 
consciousness  which  is  the  source  of  all 
appetites  and  desires,  therefore  the  high- 
est attainment  of  the  Buddhist  is  to  pass 
into  Nirvana,  which  is  an  eternal  state  of 
unconsciousness.  But  this  certainly  is  not 
the  state  of  Togo's  powerful  spirits  who 
defeated  the  Russians. 

It  is  easy  to  show  how  fundamentally 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

opposed  to  Christian  truth  this  doctrine 
is.  It  peoples  the  next  world  with  innu- 
merable millions  of  human  spirits  whose 
nature  is  not  a  whit  changed  from  that 
centric  principle  of  self  and  of  self-inter- 
est which  actuates  men  who  have  not  been 
spiritually  changed  on  this  earth.  Such 
an  immortality  therefore  would  be  noth- 
ing but  the  worst  condition  of  existence 
that  can  be  imagined. 

We  have  said  that  faith  in  human  im- 
mortality is  universal  in  the  human  race. 
Among  the  vast  peoples  of  Christendom, 
of  Mohammedanism  and  of  the  Jews  it  is 
of  course  a  fundamental  doctrine,  but  so 
it  has  been  always  and  everywhere.    The 
ent  Egyptian  was  no  simpleton.    The 
/  more  we  learn  about  that  remarkable  peo- 
ple the  higher  rises  our  estimate  of  their 
V  kfaev*     mental  ability.  But  the  Egyptian  thought 
more  about  the  other  world  than  he  did  of 
this,  and  raised  the  mightiest  of  human 
54 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

structures,  the  pyramids,  to  mark  his  tomb. 
The  Book  of  the  Dead  is  his  one  literary 
legacy  to  the  world.  Nor  is  his  belief  a 
product  only  of  advanced  thought.  It  is 
too  instinctive  for  that,  and  is  equally 
shared  with  the  rest  by  dwellers  in  wig- 
wams as  by  those  living  in  palaces.  We 
all  know  what  the  American  Indian  meant 
by  his  Happy  Hunting  Grounds.  Like- 
wise when  and  wherever  men  are  sane  and 
natural,  death  appears  simply  as  an  earth- 
ly accident,  which  instead  of  finishing  the 
personality  sets  it  free  for  a  wider  life. 


55 


Chapter  VI 

THE    VERDICT    OF    HISTORY    AS 
TO    HUMAN    NATURE 


Chapter  VI 

THE  VERDICT  OF  HISTORY  AS 
TO    HUMAN    NATURE 

IT  was  not  until  men  lost  their  self-respect 
by  submitting  to  tyrants  that  traces  of 
weakening  of  a  belief  in  the  future  life 
began  to  appear,  as  when  Greece  entered 
upon  her  decay,  and  the  Roman  Horace 
jested  about  throwing  away  his  shield 
while  he  ran  from  the  field  of  Philippi. 

This  is  also  illustrated  by  that  exclu- 
sively human  performance,  a  funeral.  It 
was  the  belief  in  the  existence  of  a  here- 
after which  was  the  origin  of  funerals. 
Twenty  thousand  years  ago  the  cave 
dwellers  had  their  funeral  rites,  and  bur- 
ied with  the  deceased  their  implements, 
and  in  the  case  of  children  their  toys,  as  if 
59 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

they  were  to  be  used  in  the  world  beyond. 
Hence  we  ourselves  can  stretch  the  hand 
of  sympathy  across  the  thousands  of  years 
to  these  primitive  men  and  women  who 
wept  over  their  dead,  while,  like  us?  they 
felt  what  a  grievous  disappointment  to  the 
human  heart  death  is. 

But,  as  we  well  know,  the  most  personal 
of  all  things  is  character.  This  raises  the 
question  what  kind  of  person  man  is.  A 
solemn  question  indeed !  History  answers 
with  its  terrible  record  of  cruelty,  exempli- 
fied from  the  flint  arrow  of  the  stone  age, 
which  for  war  was  barbed  so  that  it  could 
not  be  extracted,  through  the  war  weapons 
of  all  ages.  The  Assyrians,  when  they 
wasted  the  earth,  began  that  awful  sys- 
tem of  captivity,  which  for  inflicting  suf- 
fering could  not  be  surpassed.  In  one 
inscription  Tiglath-Pileser  named  thirty 
peoples  whom  he  thus  treated,  each  of 
whom  finally  became  extinct.  Only  one 
60 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

people  ever  survived  that  terrible  ordeal 
—the  Jews — in  their  Babylonian  captiv-' 
ity,  and  that  was  because  they  miracu- 
lously survive  everything,  as  Moses  fore- 
told that  they  would. 

But  the  acme  of  cruel  and  insolent  pride 
was  reached  in  the  Roman  triumph,  when 
many  brave,  high-souled  men  and  women 
were  often  kept  for  months,  before  the 
time  came  for  them  to  be  chained  to  the 
chariot  wheels  of  the  victor  and  dragged 
till  he  ascended  the  Capitoline  Hill,  when 
they  were  all  basely  massacred.  But  this 
Roman  people  were  hereditary  murder- 
ers, who  for  five  centuries  had  no  enter- 
tainment equal  to  the  nightly  spectacle 
of  many  men  killing  each  other  in  the 
amphitheater.  As  if  that  were  not  enough, 
wild  beasts  were  also  kept  hungry  until 
they  were  let  out  to  devour  men,  women, 
and  children,  whose  screams  afforded  sport 
to  the  vast  multitude  of  onlookers.  It  is 
61 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

well-nigh  impossible  for  us  now  to  think 
of  a  state  of  society  in  which  Maecenas, 
Horace,  Virgil,  and  other  choice  guests 
were  entertained  by  that  refined  literary 
critic,  the  Senator  Asinius  Pollio,  at  a 


banquet  in  which  a  species  of  little  fish 
were  said  to  have  such  an  exceptional 
flavor  because  they  were  fed  on  the  flesh 
of  cut-up  slaves. 

Yet  we  in  these  days  need  not  wonder  at 
these  hideous  examples  of  ancient  human 

depravity.    In  our  own  times  the  contests 

k       •       *  u 

are  changing  from  war  between  peoples 

and  countries  to  strife  between  classes. 
-  But  this  change  has  not  touched  human 
nature.  What  can  surpass  the  cowardly 
and  cold-blooded  murders  of  those  dyna- 
mite outrages  at  Los  Angeles  and  other 
places  in  our  land?  Outrages  which  only 
show  that  men  can  be  as  bad  now  as  they 
ever  were. 

History  proves  that  nothing  so  lowers 


-e, 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

the  estimate  of  the  value  of  human  life 
here  as  a  disbelief  in  man's  immortality 
hereafter.  The  historian  Sallust  reports  a 
speech  by  Julius  Caasar  in  the  Roman  Sen- 
ate in  which  Cassar  said  that  death  puts  an  ^ 
end,  and  the  same  end,  to  all  men.  Caesar  ^ 
himself  showed  afterwards  that  he  cared 
as  little  for  killing  human  beings  as  he 
would  swarms  of  flies.  Once  in  his  cam- 
paigns he  relates  how,  after  defeating  a 
German  tribe  on  the  banks  of  the  Rhine, 
he  noticed  that  their  wives  and  children 
were  on  an  island  which  could  be  reached 
by  his  cavalry,  whereupon  (as  Gibbon 
remarks)  with  cool  brevity  he  adds: 
"  For  slaughtering  them  Caesar  sent  his 
horsemen."  But  why  should  this  man, 
who,  it  is  estimated,  destroyed  1,900,000 
of  his  fellowmen,  care?  Slayer  and  slain 
would  all  soon  end  in  nothing. 

But  this  doctrine  logically  leads  to  an- 
other conclusion.     It  is  not  easy  in  this 
63 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

world  to  be  good  and  virtuous,  and  why, 
therefore,  should  anyone  trouble  himself 
about  it?  The  good  man  will  come  to  the 
same  end,  and  to  no  better  end,  than  will 
the  most  abandoned  wretch.  But  where 
is  justice,  if  after  death  there  be  no  judg- 
ment? 

Viewed  from  this  aspect  alone,  death 
appears  as  a  kindly  angel,  whose  mission 
is  to  cut  short  human  evil.  A  miser  does 
not  grow  less  miserly  as  he  grows  older, 
but  rather  each  year  adds  to  his  avarice. 
And  so  with  ambition.  Age  hardens  man 
in  every  form  of  wrong.  Therefore,  let 
death  come  to  free  the  world  from  pro- 
gressive human  evil! 

Some  theorists  would  have  us  believe 
that  evil  men  are  punished  for  their  wrong 
in  this  life,  and  they  point  to  instances  in 
which  this  is  true,  but  Julius  Caesar  ac- 
complished whatever  he  undertook,  and 
the  ages  so  abound  with  those  who  are 
64 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

like  him  in  intention  and  in  effect,  that 
the  ill  success  of  wrong  does  not  have  a 
feather's  weight  with  practical  men. 

But  we  were  not  made  to  die,  answers 
the  human  heart!  Only  abnormal  and 
diseased  minds  contradict  this.  It  was  on 
this  account  that  when  a  few  men  from 
despised  Judea  came  to  Rome  in  the  time 
of  Nero,  a  vast  multitude,  according  to 
Tacitus  soon  joined  them.  This  was  be- 
cause they  preached  not  only  the  universal 
brotherhood  of  men,  but  also  the  glad  tid- 
ings of  another  world,  not  of  death,  but  of 
eternal  life.  We  must  recall  what  Rome 
then  was,  and  how  these  men  were  literally 
as  sheep  among  wolves.  Most  of  them 
therefore  were  killed.  But  this  message 
in  time  triumphed,  despite  the  bloody  op- 
position of  the  Cassars  owing  largely  to 
the  following  potent  reasons: 

The  belief  in  immortality  is  instinctive 
with  us  all,  and  when  the  kind  of  immor- 
65 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

tality  which  these  Judeans  preached  was 
understood,  the  appeal  became  all  pre- 
vailing. It  was  not  mere  existence  in  an- 
other world,  but  existence  in  a  world  al- 
ready presaged  in  this  life;  for  there  is 
nothing  which  here  so  marks  a  high  de- 
gree of  civilization  as  cooperation.  All 
the  vast  undertakings  of  our  modern 
world  could  not  exist  but  for  cooperation, 
and  I  have  heard  Mohammedans  wonder 
how  men  could  so  trust  one  another  as  to 
form  a  great  commercial  company.  The 
old  East  India  Company,  which  for  so 
long  ruled  over  India's  millions,  was  al- 
ways an  enigma  to  Asiatics. 

But  self-seeking  and  self-aggrandize- 
ment ever  strike  at  the  root  of  coopera- 
tion. Among  pure  self-seekers  coopera- 
tion must  be  weak  or  altogether  absent. 
It  is  because  for  the  world  beyond,  Chris- 
tianity made  the  first  requisite  to  be  the 
denial  of  self  that  it  promised  such  great 
66 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

rewards.  Ignorant  persons  sometimes  de- 
cry Christianity,  because  it  does  promise 
exceeding  great  rewards;  but  no  one  can 
earn  these  rewards  except  he  deserves 
them.  An  engineer  is  paid  highly  here 
for  the  erection  of  some  vast  structure,  not 
because  he  is  an  engineer,  but  because 
men  think  that  he  can  do  it  well.  And  so  in 
the  world  of  all  cooperation  he  will  be  the 
greatest  who  can  help  or  minister  the  most 
to  others,  in  imitation  of  Him  who  first 
sacrificed  himself  on  the  Roman  cross. 

Throughout  a  long  life  I  have  heard 
many  preachers,  but  not  one  whose  ser- 
mon had  for  its  text,  "  Nay  but  I  say 
unto  you,  except  ye  repent  ye  shall  all 
likewise  perish  "  (Luke  xiii-5).  In  these 
impressive  words  our  Lord  was  referring 
to  God's  righteous  and  universal  law, 
which  is  none  other  than  the  law  of  Cause 
and  Effect.  Everyone  admits  that  this 
law  governs  the  whole  material  universe, 
67 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

but  they  may  well  pause  when  they  think 
that  the  moral  law  must  be  equally  uni- 
versal. Pride,  cruelty,  and  every  form  of 
human  evil  are  caused  by  a  self -prefer- 
ence at  the  expense  of  others,  and  this  is 
the  centric  principle  in  human  nature 
which  history  proves  that  man  has  pos- 
sessed in  every  age.  How  can  bloody  and 
every  other  kind  of  crime  fail  to  be  the 
outcome  of  such  a  characteristic?  But 
men  have  always  known  of  an  inner  voice 
whose  stern  accents  have  made  more  than 
one  Felix  tremble.  Justice  is  eternal,  as 
even  the  pagan  Roman  testifies  in  his 
saying,  "  Let  justice  be  done,  tho  the 
Heavens  fall."  Yet  in  this  world  we  do 
not  see  this  principle  sufficiently  enforced. 
All  great  races,  therefore,  have  looked  for- 
ward to  a  world  of  retribution  for  the 
wicked,  and  no  religion  emphasizes  like 
Christianity  the  need  of  a  judgment  to 
come.  It  was  only  when  the  church,  after 
68 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

that  ruinous,  so-called  conversion  of  Con- 
stantine,  adopted  the  barbarian  concep- 
tions of  hell  as  a  place  of  physical  tor- 
ment by  consuming  fire,  that  the  far  more 
awful  picture  which  reason  draws  was 
wholly  obscured.  The  parable  of  Dives 
and  Lazarus  did  not  teach  the  doctrine  of 
hell  fire,  but  only  the  impressive  lesson 
that  the  human  will  can  refuse  to  change 
its  conduct  even  though  it  be  appealed  to 
by  a  messenger  from  the  other  world. 
For  if  they  did  not  believe  Moses  and  the 
prophets,  neither  will  they  believe  tho  one 
should  rise  from  the  dead.  No  picture  of 
the  imagination  can  equal  that  which  rea- 
son tells  of  the  inevitable  condition  of  an 
eternal  world  peopled  by  the  like  of 
human  beings,  unchanged  in  spirit  from 
what  they  have  been  on  this  earth.  What 
they  would  then  do  without  a  God  to  in- 
terfere for  the  punishment  of  wrong,  can 
only  be  appreciated  after  considering  the 
69 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

awful  record  of  the  history  of  men's  deal- 
ing with  one  another  during  the  short 
life  on  this  earth.  Truly,  therefore,  did 
our  Lord  say  that  no  man  can  enter 
Heaven  without  he  be  born  again. 


70 


Chapter  VII 

CAN    LIFE    COME    INTO    EXIST- 
ENCE   BY    CHANCE? 


>  GjfAS&uS  tyse* 

/$skf1/l>     '4A*  t     &l<*  ***»+< 


VII 


CAN  LIFE  COME  INTO  EXIST- 
ENCE   BY    CHANCE? 

A  CONSISTENT  materialist  maintains  that 
the  only  and  ultimate  cause  of  anything 
is  Chance. 

Of  course  he  does  not  mean  by  this  that 
the  varied  phenomena  of  physical  life  do 
not  occur  according  to  fixed  laws,  for  that 
would  be  absurd,  but  his  contention  is  that 
those  same  laws  came  into  existence  by 
chance  and  had  nothing  to  do  with  intel- 
ligent purpose  or  design. 

This  was  one  reason  why  the  Darwin- 
ian Theory  was  so  enthusiastically  wel- 
comed by  many  writers.  Darwin  did  not 
for  a  moment  assume  that  his  theory  ac- 
counted for  the  origin  of  life,  but  only 
73 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

for  the  Origin  of  Species.  In  this  he 
entirely  ignored  the  most  ancient,  stable, 
and  largest  division  of  the  Kingdom  of 
Life,  that  of  the  microscopic  unicellular 
organism,  and  he  nowhere  alludes  to  it. 
But  this  Kingdom  in  the  living  world  is 
characterized  by  the  greatest  variety  of 
distinct  and  permanent  species.  Darwin, 
however,  confines  himself  entirely  to  the 
multicellular  forms  which  first  appeared 
in  the  Cambrian  Period.  Starting  with 
the  immeasurable  fecundity  of  living 
forms  illustrated  in  the  seeds  of  plants 
and  the  eggs  of  insects  and  of  fishes,  the 
survival  of  the  very  few  who  come  to  ma- 
turity he  ascribed  to  a  fortuitous  or  chance 
possession  by  the  individual  of  some  spe- 
cial advantage  which  was  better  adapted 
to  its  environment.  This  was  the  basic 
principle  of  his  celebrated  doctrine  of  the 
Survival  of  the  Fittest.  In  other  words 
74 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

environment  kills  off  all  those  not  adapted 
to  it. 

This  doctrine,  however,  began  to  show 
many  weak  points.  First  its  basic  prin- 
ciple was  wholly  negative.  Natural  Se- 
lection produces  nothing,  but  only  kills 
off  the  unfit.  When  a  housewife  throws 
away  the  decaying  apples  in  a  barrel,  she 
has  not  created  one  of  the  sound  apples 
which  remain.  Moreover  unlimited  fe- 
cundity rapidly  diminishes  as  we  rise  in 
the  scale,  so  that  mammals  give  birth  not 
to  great  numbers  of  offspring,  but  ordi- 
narily to  less  than  a  dozen. 

But  the  inadequacy  of  this  theory  ap- 
pears most  when  applied  to  the  internal 
organization  of  animals.  An  animal  does 
not  come  into  being  just  so.  An  eye  for 
example,  must  all  be  accounted  for  by 
natural  selection  not  as  a  whole  eye,  but 
in  all  its  parts  and  their  adjustments  to 
the  rest  of  the  organ.  I  once  counted  the 
75 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

number  of  structures  which  must  enter 
into  the  make-up  of  a  fit  human  eyelid, 
and  they  considerably  exceeded  three  hun- 
dred. Now  the  deficiency  of  any  one  of 
these  structures  would  be  sure  to  spoil  the 
eye  itself,  and  natural  selection  could  not 
do  anything  but  extinguish  all  who  had 
such  incomplete  eyelids.  But  the  re- 
mainder of  this  visual  organ  is  made  up 
of  structures  infinitely  more  complicated 
than  the  eyelid,  and  for  each  one  of  these 
natural  selection  must  be  rigidly  called  to 
give  the  explanation  according  to  its  one 
principle.  When  further  it  be  asked  to 
explain  all  the  other  parts  of  the  multi- 
cullular  body,  whether  an  ear,  a  lung,  or 
a  brain,  its  constant  inadequacy  has  led 
the  great  majority  of  biologists  to  reject 
it  altogether.  Some  scientific  investiga- 
tors indeed,  especially  in  Germany,  treat 
the  Darwinian  Theory  with  unmerited 
ridicule. 

76 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

Sir  George  Darwin,  the  son  of  Charles 
Darwin,  in  his  presidential  address  to  the 
British  Association  of  Science,  when  it 
met  in  South  Africa  in  1905,  says  that  the 
problem  of  physical  life  is  as  inscrutable 
now  as  ever.  Indeed  modern  science  finds 
that  problem  more  and  more  inscrutable 
in  proportion  to  the  progress  of  investi- 
gations on  the  subject.  One  fact  alone, 
among  others  of  like  import,  suffices  to 
illustrate  this  statement,  and  that  is,  the 
endless  complexity  of  the  chemistry  of 
any  living  thing,  or  of  anything  which 
has  been  produced  by  vital  agency,  com- 
pared with  the  chemistry  of  things  with 
which  life  has  nothing  to  do.  Inorganic 
chemistry,  or  that  which  deals  with  non- 
living substances,  is  simplicity  itself  by 
the  side  of  organic  or  life-originated  chem- 
istry. Thus  one  atom  of  hydrogen,  one 
atom  of  chlorin,  and  one  atom  of  sodium 
will  make  one  molecule  of  sodium  chlorid 
77 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

or  common  salt.  These  three  separate 
atoms  might  possibly  come  together  by 
chance — that  only  deity  of  the  materialist 
— anywhere  where  these  atoms  exist,  say  in 
the  planet  Saturn.  But  for  any  animal 
on  this  earth,  with  red  blood,  it  must,  in 
order  to  live,  have  in  its  blood  cells  that 
definite  substance  called  hemoglobin. 
Now  a  molecule  of  hemoglobin  must  con- 
tain the  following  number  of  different 
atoms  in  their  due  proportions,  namely, 
of  hydrogen  atoms,  1,130;  of  carbon 
atoms,  712;  of  nitrogen,  214;  of  oxygen, 
245;  of  sulfur,  2;  and  of  iron,  1,  or  2,304 
atoms  in  all.  Moreover,  if  that  one  atom 
of  iron,  in  its  peculiar  relation  to  the  rest 
("masked,"  as  some  physiologists  say), 
were  left  out,  the  animal  could  neither  ab- 
sorb oxygen  nor  give  off  carbonic  acid, 
in  other  words,  it  could  not  breathe.  I 
once  asked  a  well-known  physiological 
chemist,  himself  of  German  extraction 
78 


LIFE,   DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 
and  educated  in  Germany,   how  could' 
those  atoms  in  a  molecule  of  hemoglobin 
thus  come  together  by  chance?    His  brief 
reply  was,  "D — n  chance!" 

It  would  be  tedious  to  cite  the  number- 
less illustrations  of  special  adaptations  on 
the  part  of  the  different  organs  of  the 
body  in  their  functions,  or  working,  any 
one  of  which  can  be  shown  to  be  necessary 
for  the  continuance  of  life.  We  will 
therefore  only  allude  to  the  absolute  de- 
pendence of  life  on  the  healthy  perform- 
ance of  their  duties  by  four  small  and 
widely  separated  organs  called  the  duct- 
less glands,  because  they  discharge  their 
secretions  directly  into  the  blood  and  not 
like  other  glands  through  ducts.  These 
glands  are  the  adrenals ;  the  peculiar  struc- 
tures embedded  in  the  pancreas  called  the 
Islands  of  Langerhans,  after  their  discov- 
erer; the  thyroid  gland,  and  lastly  the 
Pituitary  Gland.  It  has  not  yet  been 
79 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

demonstrated,  but  it  is  strongly  suspected 
that  both  the  liver  and  the  kidneys  also 
possess  structures  which  add  internal  se- 
cretions of  their  own  to  the  blood. 

To  understand  what  part  the  adrenals 
take,  we  must  first  state  that  we  have  three 
great  nervous  systems,  namely,  the  brain, 
the  Spinal  Cord,  and  the  Great  Sympa- 
thetic. This  last,  or  the  Sympathetic,  is 
for  the  purposes  of  life,  the  most  impor- 
tant of  the  three.  The  poor  brain  may  rea- 
son and  argue  all  in  vain  about  a  love 
affair,  for  that  matter  belongs  exclusively 
to  the  Sympathetic,  and  is  one  reason  for 
its  name,  because  it  governs  the  emotions 
and  feelings.  Now  it  happens  that  at  an 
early  period  in  fetal  life  a  twig  of  the 
sympathetic  begins  to  roll  on  itself  like  a 
ball  of  twine  till  it  finally  breaks  away 
from  its  parent  nerve  and  taking  to  itself 
a  capsule  it  then  adheres  to  the  top  of  the 
80 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

kidney  on  each  side  for  life.  These  two 
small  glands  therefore  are  called  the 
adrenals,  but  they  are  more  essential  to 
life  than  the  kidneys  themselves,  for  both 
kidneys  may  be  surgically  removed  with- 
out the  animal  dying  so  promptly  as  when 
the  adrenals  are  cut  away.  Slow  destruc- 
tion by  tuberculosis,  for  example,  of  the 
adrenals  causes  that  remarkable  and  fatal 
disorder  called  Addison's  Disease  from 
the  English  physician  who  first  demon- 
strated its  dependence  on  derangements 
of  the  adrenals.  The  sufferers  die  from 
pure  debility,  and  often  the  skin  becomes 
strangely  discolored.  Now  the  adrenals 
make  nothing  less  than  a  veritable  drug 
called  adrenalin  which  is  now  sold  over 
the  counter  like  any  other  drug,  and 
which  possesses  very  valuable  properties. 
Among  others  it  can  arrest  the  progress 
of  Addison's  Disease  so  long  as  it  is  taken 
81 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

in  daily  doses,  as  I  in  common  with  other 
physicians  have  prescribed  in  several  cases 
of  this  affection. 

But  it  should  be  noted  that  branches  of 
the  sympathetic  ramify  on  the  coats  of  the 
arteries  of  the  body,  and  whose  office  is  to 
contract  the  arteries  or  to  relax  them  ac- 
cording to  the  time  needs  of  the  different 
organs.  Thus  the  stomach  requires  nine 
times  as  much  blood  when  it  is  digesting 
food  than  when  it  is  empty,  and  its  vaso- 
motor  branches  of  the  sympathetic,  as  they 
are  called,  perform  all  this  most  impor- 
tant duty  of  blood  distribution.  But  in 
Addison's  Disease  these  vasomotor  nerves 
are  paralyzed  from  deficiency  of  adrenalin 
in  the  blood,  and  we  can  remedy  this  by 
giving  this  nature-made  drug. 

The  Islands  of  Langerhans,  on  the 
other  hand,  are  peculiar  structures  consist- 
ing of  special  cells  making  isolated,  but  as 
82 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 
now  demonstrated,  very  important  little 
glands  whose  secretion  is  discharged  di- 
rectly into  the  blood  like  the  secretion  of 
the  adrenals. 

These  glands  are  embedded  in  the  body 
of  the  pancreas,  but  they  have  nothing  to 
do  with  the  secretion  of  that  vital  organ, 
for  this  is  discharged  into  the  intestine 
through  its  own  duct.  A  wasting  of  the 
Islands  of  Langerhans  at  once  causes  an 
incurable  form  of  that  fatal  disease  called 
Diabetes  Mellitus,  in  which  bread,  called 
the  staff  of  life,  becomes  a  virulent  poison. 
Diabetics,  therefore,  not  only  cannot  eat 
bread,  but  also  no  sugar  nor  starches  in 
any  form,  and  they  are  very  apt  to  die  in 
a  kind  of  coma  caused  by  a  too  acid  con- 
dition of  the  blood. 

The  functions  of  the  thyroid  gland  in 
the  neck  are  very  obscure.    They  have  to 
do  mainly  with  the  needs  of  the  body  dur- 
83 


LIFE,  DEATH,  AND  IMMORTALITY 
ing  the  reproductive  period  of  life,  for 
after  that  time  is  over  they  waste  away. 
All  that  we  can  otherwise  observe  is  that 
atrophy  of  this  gland  in  early  or  middle 
life  is  accompanied  by  a  great  secretion 
of  a  mucouslike  fluid  in  all  the  tissues  of 
the  body,  resembling  dropsy,  and  causing 
a  serious  depression  of  nervous  functions, 
particularly  of  the  mind.  This  condition 
is  now  successfully  treated  by  administer- 
ing extracts  of  the  thyroid  glands  of  sheep 
or  of  pigs.  But  other  affections  of  the 
thyroid  have  given  rise  to  a  greater  num- 
ber of  treatises  or  monographs  than  on 
any  other  subject  in  medical  literature, 
those  on  Graves's  Disease  of  the  thyroid 
alone  already  amounting  to  two  thousand. 
In  the  course  of  these  investigations  a 
number  of  little  glands  have  been  found 
embedded  in  the  body  of  the  thyroid  which 
are  called  parathyroids.  When  these  are 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

removed  the  animals  die  from  tetanic  con- 
vulsions, provided  that  they  are  not  too 
old,  because  old  dogs,  for  example,  can 
have  the  whole  thyroid  removed  without 
bad  effects. 

But  the  most  remarkable  structure  in 
the  body  is  the  Pituitary  Gland,  which  is 
situated  in  a  little  depression  in  the  most 
solid  of  bones,  at  the  base  of  the  skull. 
This  depression  is  called  from  its  shape 
the  sella  turcica,  or  Turkish  saddle. 
This  little  gland  weighs  on  the  average 
only  five  grains,  and  is  divided  into  two 
parts,  only  the  anterior  of  which  seems  to 
be  endowed  with  its  exceptional  proper- 
ties. Stimulation  of  this  gland  by  the 
proximity  of  a  tumor,  for  example,  causes 
frightful  deformities  in  the  growth  of 
bones,  especially  of  the  face,  and  in  the 
development  of  the  joints  of  the  hands  and 
feet.  If  these  changes  begin  early  in  life 
they  lead  to  gigantism,  some  of  these  per- 
85 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

sons  growing  to  over  seven  feet  in  height. 
On  the  other  hand  atrophy  or  wasting  of 
the  pituitary  leads  to  infantilism,  or 
dwarfing  of  the  body,  with  general  arrest 
of  growth  in  mind  as  well  as  in  body.  The 
pituitary  gland  from  its  solitary  position 
at  the  center  of  the  skull  was  once  sup- 
posed to  be  the  seat  of  the  soul.  But  how 
it  produces  its  widespread  effects  we  have 
no  conception. 

We  have  adduced  enough  to  show  that 
the  growth  of  an  animal  body  with  all  its 
parts  and  their  functions  is  wholly  sui 
generis,  or  of  its  own  kind.  There  is  noth- 
ing in  the  laws  of  physics  or  of  chemistry 
which  in  the  least  approaches  or  explains 
what  life  is.  And  when  we  remember  that 
everything  which  lives,  whether  a  giant 
sequoia  in  the  vegetable  kingdom,  or  an 
elephant  or  rhinoceros  in  the  animal  world, 
have  each  to  begin  their  individual  growth 
86 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

from  a  microscopic  dot,  which  dot  never- 
theless contains  all  the  past  story  of  the 
living  growth  and  every  part  of  its  fu- 
ture frame,  how  can  we  say  that  all  this 
comes  by  soulless  and  mindless  chance?' 


87 


Chapter  VIII 

RESURRECTION    OF    THE 
BODY 


Chapter  VIII 

RESURRECTION    OF    THE 
BODY 

WE  are  told  that  if  we  do  not  believe  in 
the  resurrection  of  the  body  our  faith  in 
Christ  is  vain  (1  Cor.,  xv:  13-14).  In 
other  words  the  body  of  Christ  died  as 
surely  and  as  naturally  as  any  other  hu- 
man body  dies,  but  it  came  to  life  again  so 
that  He  truly  rose  from  the  dead.  We  are 
not  left  to  doubt  that  this  statement  was 
the  very  foundation  of  the  belief  in  Christ 
by  the  whole  Church  in  the  days  of  the 
Apostles. 

Before  we  go  further  we  should  recog- 
nize how  natural  it  was  that  the  Resurrec- 
tion of  Jesus  should  outweigh  all  other 
doctrines  about  His  personality.     There 
91 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

is  nothing  so  universal  or  so  certain  as 
death,  nor  anything  so  desolating  to  the 
human  heart.  What,  therefore,  could  be 
so  welcome  as  the  Glad  Tidings  of  the 
Resurrection  of  our  Lord  from  the  dead? 

We  should  put  ourselves  in  the  place  of 
the  Apostles,  and  after  seeing  a  dear 
friend  of  ours  unmistakably  die  and  be 
buried  in  his  grave  before  our  own  eyes, 
what  would  the  effect  then  be  upon  us 
if  after  three  days  he  appeared  to  us  as 
unquestionably  alive  again?  Our  whole 
lives  would  thereafter  be  wholly  changed. 
We  would  then  know  that  death  does  not 
end  all,  but  that  beyond  death  there  is  the 
world  of  Life.  All  the  concerns  of  this 
short  life  on  earth  would  then  shrink  into 
insignificance. 

Something  like  this  must  have  occurred 

to  explain  the  remarkable  and  permanent 

change  which  took  place  in  the  thinking 

and  in  the  doing  of  those  men  at  that  time 

92 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

and  place,  which  change  lasted  with  them 
to  the  end  of  their  days.  They  were  per- 
fectly sincere  and  good  men.  All  admit 
that.  Nor  did  anything  in  their  subse- 
quent course  ever  shake  their  conviction 
in  its  truth.  For  it  was  not  based  upon  a 
single  or  isolated  apparition.  '  To  whom 
He  also  showed  Himself  alive  after  His 
passion  by  many  proofs,  appearing  unto 
them  by  the  space  of  forty  days  and  speak- 
ing of  things  concerning  the  Kingdom 
of  God"  (Actsi:3). 

Subsequently,  whether  addressing  com- 
mon or  learned  men,  or  when  arraigned 
before  governors  or  kings  as  their  Master 
had  foretold,  the  resurrection  of  Jesus 
was  their  unvarying  theme.  "  O  King 
Agrippa,"  exclaimed  Paul,  "  why  should 
it  be  incredible  to  you  if  God  should  raise 
the  dead? "  Previously  on  Mars  Hill, 
when  confronting  the  curious  and  skepti- 
cal philosophers  who  were  gathered  to 
98 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

hear  him,  he  spoke  of  the  resurrection  of 
Jesus,  whereupon  some  naturally  mocked. 

But  so  it  was  from  the  beginning. 
Only  a  few  days  had  passed,  when  upon 
the  arrest  of  Jesus  his  disciples  tell  us 
that  they  all  forsook  Him  and  fled  for 
their  lives.  Their  spokesman  Peter  from 
the  same  fear  three  times  swore  that  he 
knew  nothing  about  Him.  But  after  the 
Resurrection  they  were  wholly  altered  into 
the  boldest  of  men.  We  can  scarcely  im- 
agine the  awe  with  which  common  persons 
whose  Galilean  dialect  at  once  betrayed 
their  origin,  would  feel,  when  brought  be- 
fore the  national  Senate  or  Sanhedrin  to 
face  the  charge  that  they  laid  the  murder 
of  their  Master  on  those  same  high  offi- 
cials. Yet  they  did  this  without  hesita- 
tion, and  they  were  therefore  scourged 
for  it. 

But  we  may  be  told  that  often  there  is 
94. 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

no  accounting  for  the  vagaries  of  human 
conduct  or  beliefs.  Our  knowledge  pro- 
ceeds wholly  from  experience,  and  a  story 
which  is  contrary  to  all  human  experience 
must,  on  its  very  face,  be  improbable. 

But  we  cannot  so  dismiss  the  Resurrec- 
tion, because  the  fullest  and  most  detailed 
account  of  it  was  written  long  before  the 
narratives  of  the  four  Gospels.  St.  Paul 
wrote  the  fifteenth  chapter  of  First  Co- 
rinthians as  near  the  time  of  the  Resurrec- 
tion as  we  in  America  now  are  to  the  last 
Presidential  term  of  Mr.  Cleveland.  He 
says  that  our  Lord  appeared  at  one  time 
to  above  five  hundred  men,  the  greater 
part  of  whom  were  living  when  he  wrote, 
while  some  had  fallen  asleep.  He  then 
mentions  five  other  appearances  at  differ- 
ent times  and  to  different  persons,  the 
last  being  when  He  appeared  to  Paul 
himself,  whereupon  the  persecuting  Saul 
95 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

changed  finally  into  the  great  Apostle 
Paul  until  he  bowed  his  head  to  the 
Roman  ax. 

The  doctrine  of  the  resurrection  of  the 
body  was  by  the  Pharisees  and  by  our 
Lord  Himself  held  to  be  the  same  with 
what  we  term  human  immortality.  The 
body,  therefore,  is  as  deathless  as  the 
soul  (Matt,  xxii:  31-32;  Mark  xii:  26-27; 
Luke  xx :  35-38). 

But  the  very  important  statement  fol- 
lows that  flesh  and  blood  cannot  inherit 
the  Kingdom  of  God  nor  doth  corruption 
inherit  incorruption !  (1  Corinthians  15- 
50. )  The  risen  body,  therefore,  cannot  be 
like  the  body  which  we  know,  for  that  is 
composed  of  flesh  and  blood,  and  with  no 
other  kind  of  body  have  we  yet  any  ac- 
quaintance. But  he  goes  on  to  explain  in 
the  words,  "  It  is  sown  a  natural  (or  phys- 
ical body),  it  is  raised  a  spiritual  body," 
while  he  further  adds  that  the  physical 
96 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

body  is  sown  in  weakness  to  be  raised  as  a 
spiritual  body  in  power. 

Here  he  hears  one  say,  How  are  the 
dead  raised  and  with  what  body  do  they 
come?  Paul  loses  patience  with  this  ques- 
tion, and  appeals  to  the  greatest  mystery 
of  physical  life — a  seed.  Nothing  could 
be  more  unlike  a  seed  than  the  grown 
product  which  comes  from  it.  Unless  it 
were  actually  shown  to  be  so,  no  one 
would  think  of  connecting  the  two  to- 
gether. 

But  Paul  could  not  then  have  imagined 
how  modern  science  would  strengthen  his 
comparison.  He  looked  upon  the  seed  of 
a  common  grain  as  the  ultimate  living 
reality,  whereas  we  now  know  that  the 
living  germ  within  the  seed  is  incalculably 
smaller.  The  unicellular  germ  of  a  tow- 
ering oak  is  as  much  smaller  than  the 
acorn  which  contains  it,  as  the  acorn  it- 
self is  smaller  than  the  oak.  But  so  it  is 
97 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

in  every  form  of  life,  whether  plant  or 
animal.  (  Every  elephant  and  every  whale 
begins  its  individual  existence  with  a  ma- 
terial dot,  barely  visible  by  a  high-power 
microscope.  Yet  in  that  vanishing  speck  of 
matter  its  future  body  all  exists,  for  the 
whale  cannot  finally  grow  into  a  fish,  be- 
cause whales  are  mammals,  and  therefore 
separated  by  an  impassable  biological  gulf 
from  all  fishes. 

These  are  facts  which  only  science  could 
make  credible.  The  argument,  therefore, 
is  this:  The  human  body  has  already 
passed  through  as  great  and  marvelous, 
yet  always  connected,  changes  here  as  that 
final  change  at  the  Resurrection.  The 
Almighty  who  has  decreed  those  changes 
in  the  body  of  this  life  can  equally  order 
that  final  change  in  the  body  of  the  life 
to  come. 

But  through  all  those  changes  nothing 
is  altogether  new,  but  rather  actually 
98 


LIFE,  DEATH,  AND  IMMORTALITY 
connected  with  what  preceded  it,  so  that 
each  seed  has  its  own  body  given  to  it. 
During  its  earthly  life  the  human  body 
is  incessantly  changing  its  materials,  but 
always  under  the  control  of  one  unseen 
agency.  If  we  saw  a  great  building  con- 
stantly changing  the  stones  of  which  it  is 
made  as  they  were  worn  out,  and  new  ones 
appearing,  each  according  to  its  proper 
place,  so  that  a  stone  forming  part  of  an 
arch  is  never  found  in  a  straight  wall,  we 
would  conclude  that  an  architect  unseen 
by  us  was  superintending  it  all.  And  so 
it  is  that  all  our  bodily  changes  are  under 
the  most  rigid  supervision.  "  Even  the 
very  hairs  of  your  head  are  numbered," 
says  our  Lord. 

But   what  is   this   invisible   architect? 

None  other  than  the  real  and  true  body 

within  us,  given  to  us  from  the  beginning. 

The  New  Testament,  therefore,  warns  us 

99 


LIFE,  DEATH,  AND  IMMORTALITY 
from  committing  sins  against  the  body, 
for  they  are  not  forgiven.  Physicians  well 
know  what  these  sins  are,  and  that  they 
are  often  visited  upon  the  third  and 
fourth  generations  till  that  stock  becomes 
extinct. 

The  accounts  which  the  Gospels  give 
of  our  Lord's  actions  after  the  Resurrec- 
tion when  He  asked  His  disciples  to  reach 
forth  their  hands  and  learn  for  them- 
selves that  He  was  not  a  spirit  or  ghost, 
are  given  for  us  to  know  that  the  preva- 
lent conceptions  of  the  dead  being  ghosts 
or  shades  without  substantial  existence 
were  forever  wrong.  The  glorious  truth 
is  that  in  Heaven  our  living  bodies  will 
be  more  real  and  our  own  selves  more  per- 
sonal and  recognizable  than  ever  in  this 
present  clouded  and  imperfect  being.  All 
Christians,  therefore,  should  comfort 
themselves  about  their  dead  with  the  words 
100 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

written  in  Paul's  earliest  epistle:  "  For  if 
we  believe  that  Jesus  died  and  rose  again, 
even  so  them  also  which  are  fallen  asleep 
in  Jesus  will  God  bring  with  Him"  (1 
Thess.  iv:14). 


101 


Chapter  IX 

HEAVEN    AS    DESCRIBED    IN 
THE    BIBLE 


Chapter    IX 

HEAVEN  AS   DESCRIBED   IN 
THE    BIBLE 

THO,  as  we  have  seen,  a  belief  in  the  con- 
tinuance of  life  after  death  is  universal  in 
the  human  race,  the  Christian  religion 
differs  from  all  others  in  its  teachings  of 
the  conditions  of  the  Future  State. 

Men  naturally  have  tried  to  picture  to 
themselves  what  those  conditions  are  by 
the  help  of  the  imagination.  Now  the  im- 
agination is  purely  an  earthly  faculty 
which  can  draw  its  pictures  only  with  ma- 
terials furnished  by  earthly  experience. 
Scenes  of  which  no  earthly  vision  can 
catch  a  glimpse  are  quite  beyond  our  pic- 
turing. Men,  therefore,  in  all  ages  and 
everywhere  have  represented  the  future 
105 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

world  as  more  or  less  a  reproduction  of 
this  world. 

Thus  the  ancient  Egyptian,  as  we  have 
said,  dwelt  in  thought  more  on  the  next 
world  than  he  did  on  this.  But  he  was 
going  to  another  Egypt  whose  broad 
fields  with  their  rich  productions,  and 
whose  whole  life,  indeed,  was  but  a  dupli- 
cate of  that  in  the  Valley  of  the  Nile. 

Among  the  Greeks,  Homer  first  pic- 
tured the  coming  world  as  a  very  gloomy 
place,  not  to  be  mentioned  by  the  side  of 
this  for  light  and  joy.  Poets  and  philoso- 
phers, however,  later  substituted  for  his 
great  subterranean  abode  the  Isles  of  the 
Blessed  and  the  Elysian  Fields,  both  de- 
rived from  their  Egean  Archipelago,  or 
the  fair  slopes  of  Arcadia. 

But  the  most  earthly  of  all  creations 
was  Mohammed's  paradise.  Here  every- 
thing sensual  which  would  appeal  special- 
ly to  the  Arab  mind  was  given  in  the 
106 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

minutest  detail,  including  new  female  be- 
ings called  houris,  who  would  there  con- 
stitute an  eternal  harem. 

In  the  Old  Testament  we  first  meet 
with  that  reticence  about  the  scenes  of  the 
next  world  which  is  still  more  characteris- 
tic of  the  New  Testament.  So  strikingly 
is  this  the  case  that  some  writers  have 
maintained  that  the  old  Hebrews  were 
like  the  later  Sadducees  in  altogether  de- 
nying the  existence  of  another  world,  or 
at  best  in  believing  in  a  dark  Sheol  as  the 
abode  of  the  dead,  quite  in  keeping  with 
Homer's  conception.  But  they  thus 
ignore  those  beautiful  passages  which 
read,  "  I  will  bless  the  Lord  who  hath 
given  me  counsel.  Therefore  my  heart  is 
glad.  For  Thou  wilt  not  leave  my  soul 
to  Sheol.  Thou  wilt  show  me  the  path  of 
life.  In  Thy  presence  is  fulness  of  joy. 
In  Thy  right  hand  are  pleasures  forever- 
more  "  (Ps.  xvi,  R.  V.:  7-11  inclusive). 
107 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

"  Deliver  my  soul  from  the  wicked  by 
Thy  sword.  From  men  of  the  world  whose 
portion  is  in  this  life.  As  for  me,  I  shall 
behold  Thy  face  in  righteousness.  I  shall 
be  satisfied  when  I  wake  with  Thy  like- 
ness "  (Ps.  xvii,  R.  V. :  13-15) .  Also  an- 
other psalmist,  "  Tho  I  walk  through  the 
valley  of  the  shadow  of  death,  I  will  fear 
no  evil,  for  Thou  art  with  me.  Surely, 
goodness  and  mercy  shall  follow  me  all 
the  days  of  my  life,  and  I  will  dwell  in 
the  house  of  the  Lord  forever  "  (Ps.  xxiii, 
R.  V.:4-6).  Also  another,  "Neverthe- 
less I  am  continually  with  Thee.  Thou 
shalt  guide  me  with  Thy  counsel  and  af- 
terwards receive  me  to  glory  "  (Ps.  Ixxxiii, 
R.  V.:  23-26). 

Still  more  remarkable,  considering 
how  insatiable  human  curiosity  is  on  this 
subject,  is  the  reticence  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment. Apart  from  the  accounts  describ- 
ing the  appearances  of  our  Lord  after  His 
108 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

resurrection,  and  which,  after  all,  were  in 
earthly  surroundings,  the  only  glimpse 
given  us  about  conditions  in  Heaven  is  the 
narrative  of  the  Transfiguration.  There 
we  learn  the  precious  truth  of  personal 
recognition  in  the  future  world.  Moses 
was  Moses,  and  Elijah  was  Elijah,  tho 
separated  by  centuries  in  their  life  here. 

All  the  many  writers  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment refrain  from  describing  any  place  or 
places  in  Heaven  till  we  come  to  its  last 
book,  that  of  Revelation.  But  in  it  we 
immediately  find  that  everything  is  hid- 
den under  an  impenetrable  veil  of  meta- 
phor. It  begins  with  the  appearance  of 
seven  great  lights  on  their  golden  stands. 
But  these  are  seven  Christian  churches 
lighting  up  the  thick  darkness  of  the 
world  around  them.  The  book  then  ends 
with  a  glorious  city  whose  walls  are  built 
with  precious  stones  and  with  gates  of 
pearl.  But  we  soon  read  that  it  cannot 
109 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

be  a  literal  city,  but  instead  is  a  great  so- 
ciety of  perfected  persons,  and  also  is  the 
Bride  of  the  Lamb. 

Thus  in  great  contrast  with  other  re- 
ligions the  Bible,  whether  in  the  Old  or 
New  Testament,  says  next  to  nothing 
about  where  we  shall  be  in  the  coming 
world.  In  all  other  religions  place  is 
everything,  and  all  their  descriptions  are 
those  of  place. 

But  instead  of  place  and  its  circum- 
stances, nothing  can  be  more  full  than  the 
Bible  in  telling  us  with  Whom  we  there 
shall  be.  We  shall  indeed  meet  there  with 
minds  and  persons,  and  above  all  we  shall 
be  in  the  immediate  presence  of  God  Him- 
self! 

The  fullest  description  of  Heaven  in 
the  Bible  is  to  be  found  in  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount.  Read  between  the  lines 
it  proves  to  be  an  account  of  the  King- 
dom of  Heaven,  and  not  of  a  heavenly 
110 


LIFE,    DEATH,   AND    IMMORTALITY 

kingdom  on  earth.  It  begins  with  all  that 
need  be  said  about  God  whom  we  shall 
meet  there.  "  Blessed  are  they  that 
mourn,  for  they  shall  be  comforted." 
But  comforted  by  Whom?  This  is,  and 
always  has  been  the  world  of  those  who 
mourn,  and  often  mourn  from  no  fault  of 
theirs.  These  words  are  not  limited,  but 
will  include  those  millions  of  women  in 
Asia  and  in  Africa  whose  lot  is  so  mourn- 
ful, just  because  they  were  born  there.  So 
they  include  those  multitudes  everywhere 
whose  sufferings  often  appear  so  mys- 
teriously contrary  to  the  ordering  of  a 
good  Providence.  But  these  words  tell 
us  that  for  all  such  mourners  there  is  to 
come  an  explanation,  and  it  will  be  a 
glad  explanation. 

So  the  Sermon  goes  on  describing  Who 
and  What  God  is,  and  no  description  could 
be  more  attractive.     "Blessed  are  they 
111 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

who  do  hunger  and  thirst  after  righteous- 
ness, for  they  shall  be  filled."  Again  by 
Whom? — except  by  Him  who  is  the 
blessed  source  of  all  righteousness. 
"  Blessed  are  the  peacemakers,  for  they 
shall  be  called  the  children  of  God,"  be- 
cause children  resemble  their  father.  Like- 
wise no  one  can,  like  a  hypocrite,  pray 
to  Him,  while  he  prays  to  be  seen  of  men. 
So  He  who  gives  freely  and  to  al]  His 
children,  who  sends  His  rain  alike  on  the 
just  and  on  the  unjust,  is  not  like  those 
men  who  sound  the  trumpet  in  the  streets 
and  draw  attention  to  their  gifts.  In  our 
times  men  have  a  much  longer  trumpet 
than  the  Pharisees  could  blow  through,  in 
the  shape  of  the  modern  newspaper,  "  But 
verily  they  have  their  reward,"  by  then 
having  the  trained  beggars  of  a  continent 
crowding  to  their  doors.  All  true  prayers 
instead  are  to  be  privately  addressed  to  the 
God  who  will  see  to  their  being  answered. 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

"  Be  ye  therefore  perfect  as  your  Heav- 
enly Father  is  perfect." 

But  the  description  goes  on  to  include 
the  redeemed  ones  of  the  human  race 
whom  we  shall  meet  there.  Men  are  not 
to  harbor  any  resentment  here,  for  either 
insult  or  oppression,  because  resentment 
and  anger  or  revenge  will  have  no  place 
in  the  Kingdom  of  Him  who  is  the  God  of 
Peace. 

The  absolute  necessity,  if  one  would  en- 
ter Heaven,  of  freedom  from  every  trace 
of  enmity  in  his  heart  is  further  expressed 
in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  by  giving  this 
the  precedence  in  all  religious  observances. 
"  Leave  there  thy  gift  at  the  altar,  and  go 
first  and  be  reconciled  unto  thy  brother, 
and  then  offer  thy  gift."  Still  more  sol- 
emnly is  this  duty  enjoined  in  the  Lord's 
prayer  itself.  "  For  if  ye  forgive  men 
not  their  trespasses,  neither  will  your 
113 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

Heavenly  Father  forgive  your  tres- 
passes." 

We  often  hear  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount  spoken  of  as  a  merely  ethical  dis- 
course, teaching  men  how  they  are  to  be- 
have to  one  another  in  this  world.  As  if 
men  needed  to  be  informed  about  such 
commonplace  truths!  Men  everywhere 
know  what  they  ought  to  do  in  such  mat- 
ters, and  the  world  is  full  of  books  on  good 
morals,  from  the  writings  of  that  wretched 

sycophant  Seneca  down.    What  is  it  that 

i         11         k  -r  rt.-        i,  «. 

makes  all  such  discourse  nothing  better 

than  talk  compared  with  the  profound 
effect  on  this  human  world  of  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount?)  It  is  because  of  the  as- 
tonishing tone  of  authority  of  Him  who 
spoke  these  words  as  a  divine  messenger 
by  God  to  reveal  Himself  to  men,  and  to 
teach  what  they  must  be,  to  enter  after 
death,  the  blessed  world  beyond. 

The  other  writers  in  the  New  Testa- 
114 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

ment  never  lose  sight  of  the  next  world 
even  when  enjoining  how  the  Christian 
should  live  here.  But  what  a  world  it  is 
which  they  speak  of!  What  is  its  glory 
which  so  often  is  their  theme?  Here  in 
this  world  the  word  glory  suggests  some- 
thing spectacular,  which  ministers  to 
pride,  and  for  such  earthly  glory  this 
world  has  often  been  drenched  with  blood. 
But  in  the  Bible  the  glory  of  God  is  never 
apart  from  His  goodness.  "Let  your 
light  so  shine  before  men  that  they  may  see 
your  good  works  and  glorify,"  not  you, 
but  "  your  Father  who  is  in  Heaven."  As 
if  all  men's  good  works  are  due  to  His 
prompting.  So  will  it  be  forever  when 
men  shall  stand  before  their  Father  in 
Heaven,  evermore  shining  through  their 
good  works. 

We  now  see  that  man  is  worth  saving. 
Some  may  think  that  man  is  insignificant 
enough  as  he  dwells  on  this  little  earth, 
115 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

which  is  as  but  a  grain  of  sand  among  the 
great  stars  in  the  sky  above  him.  But 
every  world  of  matter  shrinks  to  insig- 
nificance before  one  immortal  mind,  and 
when  that  deathless  mind  is  a  human 
mind,  endowed  with  all  the  capacities 
which  he  took  with  him  from  this  world, 
imagination  fails  to  picture  such  a  being 
occupied  with  things  of  eternity. 

God  cannot,  as  He  willingly  would,  be- 
stow all  His  good  things  on  man  here  in 
this  world,  because  such  prosperity  would 
ruin  him.  What  good  therefore  man  can 
gain  here,  he  must  appreciate  first  by  its 
cost  in  labor.  But  labor  from  the  begin- 
ning is  a  curse.  When  in  Heaven  a  man 
shall  be  so  changed,  that  being  rich  toward 
God  will  never  injure  him,  he  will  then 
freely  inherit  those  true  riches  which  never 
can  be  lost  because  they  are  so  inherent 
and  personal. 

Why,  then,  need  we  be  told  what  sort 
116 


LIFE,    DEATH,    AND    IMMORTALITY 

of  a  place  Heaven  is?  (Here  on  this  poor 
earth  a  place  is  a  garden  or  a  desert 
according  to  those  who  live  there.)  By 
Nature,  Asia  Minor  is  one  of  the  fairest 
countries  on  earth,  yet  now  it  is  covered 
with  ruins,  because  in  it  both  robbery  and 
murder  are  considered  honorable.  But  in 
the  blessed  world  beyond  there  will  be  op- 
portunities without  end  for  the  develop- 
ment of  human  excellence  in  the  service 
of  Our  Heavenly  Father. 


117 


ADVERTISEMENTS 


Young's 

Analytical  Concordance 
to  the  Bible 

By  ROBERT  YOUNG,  LL.D. 

Universally  recognized  as  the  greatest  Bible  Con- 
cordance. It  contains  31 1,000  references,  marking 
30,000  New  Testament  readings.  One  feature 
which  makes  Young's  Bible  Concordance  so  widely 
accepted  is  that  it  gives  the  original  Hebrew  or 
Greek  of  any  word  in  the  English  Bible  with  the 
literal  meaning  of  each,  together  with  parallel  passages. 

THE  zoth  EDITION  marks  a  great  advance  on 
all  previous  editions.  It  is  thoroughly  revised  with 
scrupulous  care.  Its  valuable  and  important  SUP- 
PLEMENTS in  the  form  of  Index  Lexicons  to  the 
Old  and  the  New  Testaments  will  prove  of  great 
service  to  those  unacquainted  with  Hebrew  or  Greek. 
Then,  too,  there  is  given  in  this  new  edition  a 
Complete  List  of  Scripture  Names,  giving  their 
modern  pronunciation,  with  accurate  transliteration 
of  the  originals.  The  Sketch  of  Recent  Explora- 
tion in  Bible  Lands  has  been  brought  down  to  date. 
Neither  bishop  nor  student  would  want  to  be  with- 
out Young's  Analytical  Concordance  to  the  Bible. 

"  It  is  unquestionably  the  best  and  most  complete  work  of  the 
kind  ever  published."—  The  Episcopal  Recorder \  Philadelphia. 

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A    Dictionary  OF  the  Bible — Not  a  Volume  of  Speculations 
ABOUT   the  Bible. 

STANDARD   BIBLE 
DICTIONARY 

IN    ONE    VOLUME 

Prepared  under  the  Editorial  Direction  ofMelancthon  W.  Jacobus, 
Chairman ,  (Hartford),  Edward  E.  Nourse  (Hartford),  and 
jlndrew  C.  Zenos  (  McCormick)  ,in  conjunction  'with  the  most  emi- 
nent Bible  Scholars  of 'America ,  Germany,  and  Great  Britain. 

"This  is  the  best  single-volume  handbook  for 
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Being  a  wholly  new  work,  not  an  abridgment  or 
adaptation  or  imitation  of  any  other  dictionary;  being 
prepared  almost  wholly  by  men  who  have  actually 
tested  by  class-room  teaching  the  facts  and  inductions 
presented  in  their  several  contributions,  and  animated 
by  the  desire  to  set  forth  the  established  results  of 
Biblical  study  and  research,  without  personal  or  theo- 
logical bias,  it  should  satisfy,  to  the  fullest  measure 
possible,  the  needs  of  Bible  students." — J.  F. 
Me  Curdy,  Ph.D.,  LL.D.,  University  College, 
Toronto. 

"It  is  the  most  valuable  one- volume  Bible  Dictionary  ever 
published.  The  articles  are  remarkable  for  lucidity,  compact- 
ness, and  range." — Frank  K.  Sanders,  Ph.D.,D.D.,  late  Dean 
Yale  Theological  Faculty. 

In  one  Octavo  Volume.  940  pages,  300  illustrations,  n  new  maps 
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A  WORK   OF  GREAT  VALUE  TO   PHYSICIAN 
AND   LATMAN 

THE 

Psychic  Treatment 
<?/*  Nervous  Disorders 

By  DR.  PAUL  DUBOIS 

Pr»feti»r  tf  Neurofathologj,  University  of  Berne 

A  Translation    bj  Smith    Ely  Jelliffe,  M.D.,  Ph.D.  and    William 
A.  Mitt,  M.D.,  of  the  Author's  "  Let  Psjchoneurosii  " 

Thii  work  gives  the  experiences  and  principles  of  psychic 
treatment  of  nervous  disorders  based  upon  twenty  years  of  suc- 
cessful specialization  and  practise  in  this  branch  of  medical  skill. 
The  work  of  the  author  is  both  that  of  psychologist  and 
physician.  Besides  many  psychological  considerations,  the 
author  providei  a  full  description  of  the  methods  used  in  his 
practise  of  psychotherapy. 

PARTIAL  OUTLINE  OF  CONTENTS 

Modern  Medicine ;  Classification  of  the  Neuroses  ;  Rational  Basis 
of  Psychotherapy ;  The  Problem  of  Liberty;  Absolute  Responsibility; 
Difficulties  of  Moral  Orthopedia  ;  Monistic  Conception ;  Slavery  of 
the  Mind  in  the  Presence  of  Certain  Diseases;  Psychic  Symptoms  of 
Nervousness ;  Fatigability ;  Sensibility,  the  First  Condition  of  all 
Physiological  Activity;  The  Emotions;  Psychasthenia;  Hysteria; 
Melancholia;  Idea  of  Degeneracy;  The  Therapeutics  of  the  Psycho- 
neuroses  ;  Rational  Psychotherapy ;  Weir  Mitchell's  Treatment ; 
Various  Symptoms  of  Nervousness;  Treatment  of  Dyspeptics;  Influ- 
ence of  Mental  Representations  on  the  Intestine;  Habitual  Constipa- 
tion ;  Disturbance  of  Circulation  ;  Disturbance  of  Urinary  Function  ; 
Troubles  with  Sleep;  Various  Nervous  Attacks;  Disturbance  of  Motil- 
ity  ;  Conditions  of  Helplessness  in  Various  Motor  Domains ;  Example 
of  Psychic  Treatment  in  a  Case  of  Psychonearosis  with  Multiple  Symp- 
toms; Proofs  of  the  Value  of  Moral  Treatment  in  Psychoneuroses ; 
Psychotherapeutic  Treatment  Without  the  Intervention  of  Physical 
Measures;  Etiology  of  the  Psychonevroses ;  Conclusion*. 

8vo,  Cloth,  47  f  Pages.  $3,  net;  by  mail,  $3.15. 
Copious  Index 

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BY  THE  AUTHOR  OF   "THE  PSYCHIC  TREATMENT 
OF  NERVOUS  DISORDERS,"  "SELF-CONTROL,"  ETC. 

REASON  AND 
SENTIMENT 

By  Prof.  PAUL  DUBOIS,  M.D. 

A  charmingly  written  essay  on  the  rela- 
tive value  of  reason  and  sentiment  in  de- 
termining the  moral  side  of  the  springs  of 
our  everyday  actions.  When  sentiment 
and  when  reason  should  determine  our 
line  of  conduct  is  clearly  set  forth,  and  the 
effects  of  a  well-regulated  mind  as  the  basis 
of  a  well-balanced  judgment.  It  will  be 
found  especially  helpful  in  formulating  in 
the  minds  of  parents  proper  sentiments  in 
training  their  children's  intellectual  life. 

"An  address  emphasizing  the  value  of  suppressing  mere  feel- 
ing or  animal  instinct,  and  building  in  every  human  being  an 
orderly  system  of  morals,  shaped  by  reason."— Traveler,  Bos- 
ton, Mass. 

"Dr.  Dubois  reinforces  a  clearly  stated  argument  with  simple 
and  convincing  illustrations.  With  customary  lucidity  he  de- 
velops his  argument,  and  indicates  its  practical  application."— 
Times,  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 

"The  argument  is  put  so  clearly,  so  concisely,  and  in  such  an 
amicable  way  that  we  believe  there  are  few  of  Dr.  Dubois' 
readers  who  will  not  follow  it  with  interest  and  pleasure."— 
The  Evening  Sun,  New  York. 

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THIRTY  EDITIONS  SINCE  PUBLICATION 


THE  EDUCATION 
OF  THE  WILL 

By  JULES  PAYOT,  Litt.D.,  Ph.D. 

"Translated  from  the  French  by  Smith  Ely  Jelliffe.  M.D.,  Prtfesior 
Clinical  Psychiatry,  Fordham  University,  New  Ttrk 

This  is  a  scientific  yet  popular  work  giving  valuable 
suggestions  and  exercises  for  a  judicious  training  of  the 
will.  In  the  fifteen  years  since  it  first  came  out  in 
French,  it  has  passed  through  thirty  editions.  Trans- 
lations have  been  made  into  many  languages.  An 
American  edition  has  now  for  the  first  time  been  un- 
dertaken. The  work  is  both  theoretical  and  prac- 
tical, and  promises  to  have  a  wide  number  of  read- 
ers in  the  medical  profession,  and  to  prove  of  vital 
interest  to  everyone  interested  in  psychology  and 
mental  therapeutics. 

THE  NEfT  YORK  EVENING  SUN  thinks; 

"  His  treatise  is  the  most  thoughtful  the  most  systematic,  and,  if 
we  may  so  express  it,  the  most  business-like  we  know  of." 

THE  BROOKLYN  TIMES  says: 

"  It  must  be  declared  in  uncompromising  terms  that  this  i«  a  valu- 
able, perhaps  a  great  book.  .  .  .  In  this  haphazard,  nervous  age  such 
a  book  as  this  is  a  tonic.  It  preaches  the  gospel  America  needs.'1 

THE  PHILADELPHIA  NORTH  AMERICAN  declares: 

"  It  is  a  prescription  for  the  atttainment  of  self-mastery  which  is 
procurable  in  the  '  drug-store  '  of  most  any  mind,  and  of  which  men  in 
general  stand  in  immediate  need  at  the  present  moment." 

CAUTION— Be  sure  that  it  is  PAYOTS  book  that  j»u 
buy  as  there  is  another  book  -with  the  same  title,  but  which 
has  no  relation  to  this. 

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AN  EXHAUSTIVE   TREATMENT  OF  THE  MEN- 
TAL FACTOR  IN  MEDICINE 

"  Fitted  to  prove  a  stimulus  to  thought  upon  a  subject  of 
much  importance  to  the  medical  profession." — Scottish  Medi- 
cal and  Surgical  Journal. 

The  Force  of  Mind 

By  A.  T.  SCHOFIELD,  M.D.,  M.R.C.S.E 

The  action  of  the  mind  in  the  cause  and  cure  of 
important  disorders  is  considered  in  this  book  from 
scientific  standpoints.  In  emphasizing  the  impor- 
tance of  the  mental  factor  in  therapeutics  the  author 
by  no  means  depreciates  the  advance  or  the  impor- 
tance of  the  art  of  medicine.  The  book  claims  that 
drugs  have  a  twofold  value — physical  and  psychical 
— and  urges  the  physician  to  study  men  as  men, 
mastering  the  intricacies  of  spirit,  soul,  and  body. 

THE   CONTENTS 

Psycho-Therapy 

Mental  Factor  in  Organic  Dis- 


The  Force  of  Mind 
Illustrations  of  Curative  Power 

of  Mind 
Psycho-Physiology 


The  /Etiology  of  Hysteria 

Some  Varieties  of  Mental  Thera- 
peutics 

Treatment  of  Functional  Nerve 
Diseases 

The  Unity  of  Mind 

Psycho-Pathology 


eases 

Causes  and  Symptoms  of  Func- 
tional Nerve  Diseases 

Phenomena  and  Illustrations  of 
Hysteria 

The  Vis  Medicatrix  Naturae 

Mental  Therapeutics  in  Nerve 
Diseases 

The  Therapeutics  of  Hysteria 


The  Practical  Conclusions 


"  The  demand  for  a  second  edition  of  this  work  shows  that 
the  medical  mind  has  found  in  it  food  for  thought  and  a  help- 
ful guide  in  the  control  of  the  mental  state  in  many  physical 
ailments,"  —  Chicago  Medical  Recorder. 


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LONG  LIFE 

AND 

How  TO  ATTAIN  IT 

By  PEARCE  KINTZING,   M.D. 

The  loftiest  ideal  of  every  right-minded  person  is 
to  live  to  a  sound,  healthy  old  age.  Ponce  de 
Leon,  the  Spanish  explorer,  thought  that  somewhere 
there  bubbled  a  perpetual  fountain  of  youth.  He 
searched,  but  never  found  those  waters,  nor  can 
anybody  else  find  them.  Yet  there  does  exist  a 
real  way,  and  Dr.  Kintzing  points  it  out  in  LONG 
LIFE  AND  HOW  TO  ATTAIN  IT,  by  which 
the  great  majority  of  people  can  enjoy  health  in 
youth  and  in  old  age.  The  author  has  written  in  a 
style  that  everyone  can  understand,  and  his  book  is 
conspicuously  placed  on  the  library  table  of  every 
good  home.  Teachers  and  nurses  find  it  full  of 
suggestion.  No  doctor  would  want  to  lack  the 
knowledge  to  be  had  in  its  chapter  on  disease,  con- 
tagion, and  infection. 

"  Eminently  wise  and  practical — a  gem  which  deserves  to  be 
in  the  hands  of  all  children  as  they  leave  school,  in  the  hands 
of  parents,  and  certainly  of  all  teachers." — L.  R.  KLEMM, 
Bureau  of  Education,  Washington,  D.  C. 

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THE  MARVELS 
BEYOND  SCIENCE 

By  JOSEPH  GRASSET,  M.D. 

Translated  from  tht  French  by  Rene  Jacques  Tubeauf. 

Beyond  science — positive  science — lies  a  border- 
land of  facts  and  fancies,  knocking,  as  it  were,  to 
be  admitted  to  the  realm  of  the  logical  and  under- 
stood. In  this  book  Dr.  Grasset  has  aimed 
scrupulously  to  mark  the  boundary  between  things 
already  known  and  those  which  still  remain  beyond 
our  understanding.  He  presents  "a  disocculated 
realm  " — that  is,  he  presents  phenomena  that  for- 
merly were  looked  upon  as  occult,  but  which  are 
now  fully  explained  and  accounted  for.  Among 
those  are  hypnotic  sleep,  the  unconscious  will  of 
movers  of  tables,  the  unconscious  imagination  of 
mediums,  and  the  unconscious  memory  of  hypnotized 
persons.  Dr.  Grasset  seeks  out  causes  in  the  known 
forces  of  life,  and  thus  shows  how  remarkable  is  the 
progress  that  has  been  made  in  reducing  these  phe- 
nomena to  science.  Among  these  are  mental 
suggestions,  direct  intercourse  of  thought,  articles 
removed  without  touch,  sight  through  opaque  sub- 
stances, telepathy,  premonitions,  materializations,  etc. 

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